What do students need to communicate with confidence?

If students are to speak they need:

• stimulus and time to think of something to say
• to be able to relate to the topic
• the language to say what they want to say
• a reason to say it
• someone to communicate with
• the confidence to speak in English

Adults have as many inhibitions as teenagers, sometimes more. Being adults, they have more ‘face’ to lose so they don’t like taking risks. They often don’t want to make mistakes in front of other students and this greatly restricts their willingness to speak. In Cutting Edge Intermediate, the exercises grow from stimulus to language input, through practice and mini-tasks towards the main task, which is the focus of the module. This helps to develop their confidence to speak.

Using Module 3 in Cutting Edge Intermediate as an example, let’s see how we can provide an environment to encourage adult students to speak.

Stimulus
The module begins with a Geography Quiz containing questions such as: Which is the longest river in the world? Which is the second longest? This quiz also introduces some of the language of comparatives and superlatives, which is presented more formally in the Analysis section. Notice that Cutting Edge Intermediate goes beyond the bare comparative or superlative to more sophisticated expressions such as: 'X is slightly higher than Y'. 'X is one of the least populated …'.

Personalised practice
The language introduced in the Quiz and Analysis sections is practised in a pair work task in which students compare themselves with their partners in statements like: 'I went to bed earlier than my partner last night'.

Extending language A new Language Focus Section extends the language for making comparisons and talking about similarities. This is practised with an exercise comparing two pictures of the same sitting room. The similarities and differences are found first individually and then shared in groups. The same language is practised through a listening activity. Later the same language is used in a reading activity. This helps to develop familiarity with the language and build the students' confidence.

Personalised discussion - providing a reason to speak
The reading activity is followed by an informal discussion.

Have you ever visited any of the historical cities mentioned in the text?
Are there any famous historical sights you would especially like to see?
If you could spend a weekend in any city in the world, which would you choose and why?

Look at the above questions carefully and notice the difference in the extent and complexity of language required in the response.

Communicating with others
The task is to present an itinerary for a group visiting the student’s home country. The preparation for this task involves listening to someone advising a friend who is to visit Ireland. Students study the linguistic features of the listening text. This task identifies who they need to communicate with.

Planning for confidence
The students first decide the extent of their task. They choose the group for which they will plan a tour, decide if the tour will cover the whole country or just part of it, and the duration of the tour. After planning the route, they draw a map to illustrate the itinerary. The map also acts as a 'prompt' for the presenters.

Follow Up
Students in the 'audience' for the presentations can comment on the presentation skills of their fellow students. In this way all the students are involved and can learn from each other. Make sure that the feedback is constructive and positive. You might like to record students' presentations to identify linguistic and presentational errors for further work.

For more useful Resources for your students, visit the Cutting Edge Companion Website.

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