English Skills

English Skills

When we think of English skills, the 'four skills' of listening, speaking, reading, and writing readily come to mind. Of course other skills such as pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, and spelling all play a role in effective English communication. The amount of attention you give to each skill area will depend both the level of your learners as well as their situational needs. Generally beginners, especially those who are nonliterate, benefit most from listening and speaking instruction with relatively little work on reading and writing. As fluency increases, the amount of reading and writing in your lessons may also increase. With advanced learners, up to half of your lesson time can be spent on written skills, although your learners may wish to keep their focus weighted toward oral communication if that is a greater need.

Teaching Listening

Listening skills are vital for your learners. Of the 'four skills,' listening is by far the most frequently used. Listening and speaking are often taught together, but beginners, especially non-literate ones, should be given more listening than speaking practice. It's important to speak as close to natural speed as possible, although with beginners some slowing is usually necessary. Without reducing your speaking speed, you can make your language easier to comprehend by simplifying your vocabulary, using shorter sentences, and increasing the number and length of pauses in your speech.

There are many types of listening activities. Those that don't require learners to produce language in response are easier than those that do. Learners can be asked to physically respond to a command (for example, "please open the door"), select an appropriate picture or object, circle the correct letter or word on a worksheet, draw a route on a map, or fill in a chart as they listen. It's more difficult to repeat back what was heard, translate into the native language, take notes, make an outline, or answer comprehension questions. To add more challenge, learners can continue a story text, solve a problem, perform a similar task with a classmate after listening to a model (for example, order a cake from a bakery), or participate in real-time conversation.

Good listening lessons go beyond the listening task itself with related activities before and after the listening. Here is the basic structure:

Before Listening
Prepare your learners by introducing the topic and finding out what they already know about it. A good way to do this is to have a brainstorming session and some discussion questions related to the topic. Then provide any necessary background information and new vocabulary they will need for the listening activity.

During Listening
Be specific about what students need to listen for. They can listen for selective details or general content, or for an emotional tone such as happy, surprised, or angry. If they are not marking answers or otherwise responding while listening, tell them ahead of time what will be required afterward.

After Listening
Finish with an activity to extend the topic and help students remember new vocabulary. This could be a discussion group, craft project, writing task, game, etc.

The following ideas will help make your listening activities successful.

Noise
Reduce distractions and noise during the listening segment. You may need to close doors or windows or ask children in the room to be quiet for a few minutes.

Equipment
If you are using a cassette player, make sure it produces acceptable sound quality. A counter on the machine will aid tremendously in cueing up tapes. Bring extra batteries or an extension cord with you.

Repetition
Read or play the text a total of 2-3 times. Tell students in advance you will repeat it. This will reduce their anxiety about not catching it all the first time. You can also ask them to listen for different information each time through.

Content
Unless your text is merely a list of items, talk about the content as well as specific language used. The material should be interesting and appropriate for your class level in topic, speed, and vocabulary. You may need to explain reductions (like 'gonna' for 'going to') and fillers (like 'um' or 'uh-huh').

Recording Your Own Tape
Write appropriate text (or use something from your textbook) and have another English speaker read it onto tape. Copy the recording three times so you don't need to rewind. The reader should not simply read three times, because students want to hear exact repetition of the pronunciation, intonation, and pace, not just the words.

Video
You can play a video clip with the sound off and ask students to make predictions about what dialog is taking place. Then play it again with sound and discuss why they were right or wrong in their predictions. You can also play the sound without the video first, and show the video after students have guessed what is going on.

Homework
Give students a listening task to do between classes. Encourage them to listen to public announcements in airports, bus stations, supermarkets, etc. and try to write down what they heard. Tell them the telephone number of a cinema and ask them to write down the playing times of a specific movie. Give them a tape recording of yourself with questions, dictation, or a worksheet to complete.

Look for listening activities in the Activities and Lesson Materials sections of this guide. If your learners can use a computer with internet access and headphones or speakers, you may direct them toward the following listening practice sites. You could also assign specific activities from these sites as homework. Teach new vocabulary ahead of time if necessary.

Teaching Reading

We encounter a great variety of written language day to day -- articles, stories, poems, announcements, letters, labels, signs, bills, recipes, schedules, questionnaires, cartoons, the list is endless. Literate adults easily recognize the distinctions of various types of texts. This guide will not cover instruction for learners with little or no literacy in their native language; you will need to work intensively with them at the most basic level of letter recognition and phonics.

Finding authentic reading material may not be difficult, but finding materials appropriate for the level of your learners can be a challenge. Especially with beginners, you may need to significantly modify texts to simplify grammar and vocabulary. When choosing texts, consider what background knowledge may be necessary for full comprehension. Will students need to "read between the lines" for implied information? Are there cultural nuances you may need to explain? Does the text have any meaningful connection to the lives of your learners? Consider letting your students bring in their choice of texts they would like to study. This could be a telephone bill, letter, job memo, want ads, or the back of a cereal box. Motivation will be higher if you use materials of personal interest to your learners.

Your lesson should begin with a pre-reading activity to introduce the topic and make sure students have enough vocabulary, grammar, and background information to understand the text. Be careful not to introduce a lot of new vocabulary or grammar because you want your students to be able to respond to the content of the text and not expend too much effort analyzing the language. If you don't want to explain all of the potentially new material ahead of time, you can allow your learners to discuss the text with a partner and let them try to figure it out together with the help of a dictionary. After the reading activity, check comprehension and engage the learners with the text, soliciting their opinions and further ideas orally or with a writing task.

Consider the following when designing your reading lessons.

Purpose
Your students need to understand ahead of time why they are reading the material you have chosen.

Reading Strategies
When we read, our minds do more than recognize words on the page. For faster and better comprehension, choose activities before and during your reading task that practice the following strategies.

Prediction: This is perhaps the most important strategy. Give your students hints by asking them questions about the cover, pictures, headlines, or format of the text to help them predict what they will find when they read it.

Guessing From Context: Guide your students to look at contextual information outside or within the text. Outside context includes the source of the text, its format, and how old it is; inside context refers to topical information and the language used (vocabulary, grammar, tone, etc.) as well as illustrations. If students have trouble understanding a particular word or sentence, encourage them to look at the context to try to figure it out. Advanced students may also be able to guess cultural references and implied meanings by considering context.

Skimming: This will improve comprehension speed and is useful at the intermediate level and above. The idea of skimming is to look over the entire text quickly to get the basic idea. For example, you can give your students 30 seconds to skim the text and tell you the main topic, purpose, or idea. Then they will have a framework to understand the reading when they work through it more carefully.

Scanning: This is another speed strategy to use with intermediate level and above. Students must look through a text quickly, searching for specific information. This is often easier with non-continuous texts such as recipes, forms, or bills (look for an ingredient amount, account number, date of service, etc.) but scanning can also be used with continuous texts like newspaper articles, letters, or stories. Ask your students for a very specific piece of information and give them just enough time to find it without allowing so much time that they will simply read through the entire text.

Silent Reading vs. Reading Aloud
Reading aloud and reading silently are really two separate skills. Reading aloud may be useful for reporting information or improving pronunciation, but a reading lesson should focus on silent reading. When students read silently, they can vary their pace and concentrate on understanding more difficult portions of the text. They will generally think more deeply about the content and have greater comprehension when reading silently. Try extended silent reading (a few pages instead of a few paragraphs, or a short chapter or book for advanced students) and you may be surprised at how much your learners can absorb when they study the text uninterrupted at their own pace. When introducing extended texts, work with materials at or slightly below your students' level; a long text filled with new vocabulary or complex grammar is too cumbersome to understand globally and the students will get caught up in language details rather than comprehending the text as a whole.

Teaching Speaking

Speaking English is the main goal of many adult learners. Their personalities play a large role in determining how quickly and how correctly they will accomplish this goal. Those who are risk-takers unafraid of making mistakes will generally be more talkative, but with many errors that could become hard-to-break habits. Conservative, shy students may take a long time to speak confidently, but when they do, their English often contains fewer errors and they will be proud of their English ability. It's a matter of quantity vs. quality, and neither approach is wrong. However, if the aim of speaking is communication and that does not require perfect English, then it makes sense to encourage quantity in your classroom. Break the silence and get students communicating with whatever English they can use, correct or not, and selectively address errors that block communication.

Speaking lessons often tie in pronunciation and grammar (discussed elsewhere in this guide), which are necessary for effective oral communication. Or a grammar or reading lesson may incorporate a speaking activity. Either way, your students will need some preparation before the speaking task. This includes introducing the topic and providing a model of the speech they are to produce. A model may not apply to discussion-type activities, in which case students will need clear and specific instructions about the task to be accomplished. Then the students will practice with the actual speaking activity.

These activities may include imitating (repeating), answering verbal cues, interactive conversation, or an oral presentation. Most speaking activities inherently practice listening skills as well, such as when one student is given a simple drawing and sits behind another student, facing away. The first must give instructions to the second to reproduce the drawing. The second student asks questions to clarify unclear instructions, and neither can look at each other's page during the activity. Information gaps are also commonly used for speaking practice, as are surveys, discussions, and role-plays. Speaking activities abound; see the Activities and Further Resources sections of this guide for ideas.

Here are some ideas to keep in mind as you plan your speaking activities.

Content
As much as possible, the content should be practical and usable in real-life situations. Avoid too much new vocabulary or grammar, and focus on speaking with the language the students have.

Correcting Errors
You need to provide appropriate feedback and correction, but don't interrupt the flow of communication. Take notes while pairs or groups are talking and address problems to the class after the activity without embarrassing the student who made the error. You can write the error on the board and ask who can correct it.

Quantity vs. Quality
Address both interactive fluency and accuracy, striving foremost for communication. Get to know each learner's personality and encourage the quieter ones to take more risks.

Conversation Strategies
Encourage strategies like asking for clarification, paraphrasing, gestures, and initiating ('hey,' 'so,' 'by the way').

Teacher Intervention
If a speaking activity loses steam, you may need to jump into a role-play, ask more discussion questions, clarify your instructions, or stop an activity that is too difficult or boring.

Teaching Writing

Good writing conveys a meaningful message and uses English well, but the message is more important than correct presentation. If you can understand the message or even part of it, your student has succeeded in communicating on paper and should be praised for that. For many adult ESL learners, writing skills will not be used much outside your class. This doesn't mean that they shouldn't be challenged to write, but you should consider their needs and balance your class time appropriately. Many adults who do not need to write will enjoy it for the purpose of sharing their thoughts and personal stories, and they appreciate a format where they can revise their work into better English than if they shared the same information orally.

Two writing strategies you may want to use in your lessons are free writing and revised writing. Free writing directs students to simply get their ideas onto paper without worrying much about grammar, spelling, or other English mechanics. In fact, the teacher can choose not to even look at free writing pieces. To practice free writing, give students 5 minutes in class to write about a certain topic, or ask them to write weekly in a journal. You can try a dialog journal where students write a journal entry and then give the journal to a partner or the teacher, who writes another entry in response. The journals may be exchanged during class, but journal writing usually is done at home. The main characteristic of free writing is that few (if any) errors are corrected by the teacher, which relieves students of the pressure to perform and allows them to express themselves more freely.

Revised writing, also called extended or process writing, is a more formal activity in which students must write a first draft, then revise and edit it to a final polished version, and often the finished product is shared publicly. You may need several class sessions to accomplish this. Begin with a pre-writing task such as free writing, brainstorming, listing, discussion of a topic, making a timeline, or making an outline. Pairs or small groups often work well for pre-writing tasks. Then give the students clear instructions and ample time to write the assignment. In a class, you can circulate from person to person asking, "Do you have any questions?" Many students will ask a question when approached but otherwise would not have raised a hand to call your attention. Make yourself available during the writing activity; don't sit at a desk working on your next lesson plan. Once a rough draft is completed, the students can hand in their papers for written comment, discuss them with you face to face, or share them with a partner, all for the purpose of receiving constructive feedback. Make sure ideas and content are addressed first; correcting the English should be secondary. Finally, ask students to rewrite the piece. They should use the feedback they received to revise and edit it into a piece they feel good about. Such finished pieces are often shared with the class or posted publicly, and depending on the assignment, you may even choose to 'publish' everyone's writing into a class booklet.

Tactful correction of student writing is essential. Written correction is potentially damaging to confidence because it's very visible and permanent on the page. Always make positive comments and respond to the content, not just the language. Focus on helping the student clarify the meaning of the writing. Especially at lower levels, choose selectively what to correct and what to ignore. Spelling should be a low priority as long as words are recognizable. To reduce ink on the page, don't correct all errors or rewrite sentences for the student. Make a mark where the error is and let the student figure out what's wrong and how to fix it. At higher levels you can tell students ahead of time exactly what kinds of errors (verbs, punctuation, spelling, word choice) you will correct and ignore other errors. If possible, in addition to any written feedback you provide, try to respond orally to your student's writing, making comments on the introduction, overall clarity, organization, and any unnecessary information.

Consider the following ideas for your writing lessons.

Types of Tasks
Here are some ideas for the types of writing you can ask your students to do.

Copying text word for word

Writing what you dictate

Imitating a model

Filling in blanks in sentences or paragraphs

Taking a paragraph and transforming certain language, for example changing all verbs and time references to past tense

Summarizing a story text, video, or listening clip (you can guide with questions or keywords)

Making lists of items, ideas, reasons, etc. (words or sentences depending on level)

Writing what your students want to learn in English and why

Writing letters (complaint, friend, advice) - give blank post cards or note cards or stationery to add interest; you can also use this to teach how to address an envelope

Organizing information, for example making a grid of survey results or writing directions to a location using a map

Reacting to a text, object, picture, etc. - can be a word or whole written piece

Format
Clarify the format. For an essay, you may specify that you want an introduction, main ideas, support, and a conclusion. For a poem, story, list, etc., the format will vary accordingly, but make sure your students know what you expect.

Model
Provide a model of the type of writing you want your students to do, especially for beginners.

Editing
Consider giving students a checklist of points to look for when editing their own work. Include such things as clear topic sentences, introduction and conclusion, verb tenses, spelling, capitalization, etc.

Correction
Minimize the threatening appearance of correction. Instead of a red pen, use green or blue or even pencil, as long as it's different from what the student used. Explain to the students that you will use certain symbols such as VT for verb tense or WO for word order, and be very clear whether a mark (check mark, X, star, circle) means correct or incorrect as this varies among cultures.