'Everybody's Talkin' Part 3

Speaking Tests Revision Lessons

The revision lessons for the speaking tests are all the same regardless of grade or level. They are basically cramming sessions. I have discovered that time is short and covering all the questions can be challenging. Earlier mistakes in managing time have taught me that I have no time for a warm up or for much pair work or group activities. I give the briefest of introductions and launch straight into the questions.

At the beginning of the lesson I have to explain what is actually happening – they are going to have a speaking test in their next lesson with me and in this lesson we are going to practice. The fact that they have a speaking test is often news to the students. It’s as if they can’t believe it sometimes. They say ‘oh no!’ and ‘oh my god!’ I tell them not to worry, ‘it’s easy!’ I hand out the test questions and explain that when we practice today I want them to write answers. I want them to write answers so they can study them later. Throughout the lesson I will constantly go around making sure they are writing example answers for each of the questions and correcting errors, making suggestions.

These lessons require a lot of energy on my part for a couple of reasons; there are no activities apart from some pair work, so I have to keep the students interested and engaged by expressive behavior and enthusiasm; and there is a lot of teacher talking time. I think these lessons can be quite intense for the students too. The evidence of past classes indicates that the affective filter rises immediately when they are told they are going to be tested – many students seem to get anxious so easily. Furthermore, the simple fact that they are practicing and writing for the whole lesson must be difficult for them too. My main tool in overcoming this anxiety and the monotony of the revision classes (besides my own behavior) is the PowerPoint I make to accompany the lessons. Last year I made the mistake of using a PowerPoint that literally just had slides of different questions and some examples. I found that once I ‘livened up’ the PowerPoint with pictures and photographs of things I can use to elicit answers or discuss examples it makes a world of difference. I’m happy to note that with my new improved PowerPoint and my slightly improved confidence in using 'making input comprehensible' techniques the revision lessons this semester have seen a big improvement on last year.

Some of the niceties of normal lessons have to be dispensed with for the revision classes. The preview, present, practice, produce model is pretty much out the window. I don’t introduce any new L2. Theoretically everything in the lesson should fall into the category of linguistic schema because it has been studied and covered already. There is no top-down bottom-up structuring. There is no ‘topic’ to hook the students to. Overall, the questions, language and grammar we practice are not authentic because the context is cramming for a test. Furthermore, because I’m not introducing new input or language I suppose I’m not really using ‘making input comprehensible’ techniques. However, this can’t be correct (a problem with definition?) because I have been specifically repeating, rephrasing, using visuals and providing examples throughout all the revision lessons. Perhaps in this context I should refer to these as ‘classroom interaction’ techniques.

In fact after Saturday’s methodology crash course revision in 'making input comprehensible' and 'classroom interaction' techniques I was determined to make a concerted effort to use more in my revision classes. I have been modeling, gesturing, repeating slowly, chunking, role-play modeling with co-teachers, rephrasing, asking questions and making corrections. After four classes of this in a day I’m exhausted. Where is my stamina? But it does appear to help and really propels the lessons along.

Here is an example of a test question from the grade 1 paper:

3. Did you eat breakfast this morning? (Page 125)

· What time did you eat breakfast?

· What did you eat?

Before I ask them the question I put on a PowerPoint slide of a full English breakfast – bacon, sausages, eggs etc. I ask, gesturing, ‘what is this?’ Pretty quickly they answer ‘breakfast’ or name ‘sausage’ or ‘tomato’ or something. Once they say ‘breakfast’ I ask ‘is it a Korean breakfast?’, ‘Nooooo!’ ‘Where do they eat this breakfast?’ ‘America.’ ‘England.’ I tell them ‘that’s right, it’s an English breakfast.’ For fun I ask them what all the different parts are. (They always say the beans are spaghetti) It’s surprising to me how engaging for the students this little interaction is – it always generates enthusiasm and elicits lots of responses. Finally, I ask them ‘does it look delicious?’ They almost all say ‘noooo!’ So I ask what is delicious for breakfast but before they answer I say ‘wait! First…’ and I put the next slide on which has the question ‘did you eat breakfast this morning?’ and the answer ‘yes, I ate breakfast this morning’ and go into modeling the question.

I have been trying hard to improve the modeling. First I say ‘everyone’ and gesture for them to repeat as I ‘chunk’ the question into three parts – ‘did you’ (students repeat) ‘eat breakfast’ (students repeat) ‘this morning?’ (Students repeat) Then I break it into two parts – ‘did you eat breakfast’ (students repeat) ‘this morning?’ (students repeat) I point and ask ‘what is morning?’, 'what is breakfast?’ I give them a little time to write the answer and move onto the next slide.

The next slide is a picture of an alarm clock. I ask ‘what is this?’ ‘Watch’, ‘clock’. ‘What kind of clock?’ ‘An alarm clock’. ‘What time is it?’ ‘6 o’clock.’ ‘That’s right’. The next slide is a picture of a digital clock displaying ‘7 am’. I ask the same set of questions for this slide as for the alarm clock but I also ask ‘when is am?’ ‘Morning!’

The next slide has the next question and three example answers:

• What time did you eat breakfast?

• I ate breakfast at 6 o’clock

• I ate breakfast at 7am

• I ate breakfast at 7.30

Again I use chunking, choral repetition, gestures and slowing down my rate of delivery to convey the examples. I ask ‘is this too early for breakfast?’ and they almost always say ‘yes!’ So then I ask ‘when is a good time for breakfast?’ and write some of their answers on the board. I gave them some time to write an answer and go around checking whilst they are scribbling.

The next 3 slides show ‘bread’, ‘cereal’ and 'rice’. I ask what each is and then show the slide that explains the questions and examples. I go through the same process as before but this time also ask ‘so what is delicious in the morning?’ I can’t believe so many people eat kimchi for breakfast.

This is essentially the same system I go through for each question. If there’s time I will get the students to practice each question with their partner. Often there is not time. I try and include some visuals that I can use to introduce each question and elicit some answers instead of jumping into the question straight away. It helps if I can engage their interest before practicing the question, whatever it may be. Without this visual stimulus the revision is a real grind for the students. I try and break it up as much as possible.

I have been trying to think of structural ways to improve the revision lessons but so far haven’t come up with anything. Time is again the enemy – I have to cover all the questions in one 45 minute class. If I had more time I could design activities and exercises for revising the dialogue. What else can I do to improve the revision classes for my students?