CC BY
26PEDAGOGICAL SCIENCES
CLT ACTIVITIES DEVELOPING SPEAKING AND FLUENCY
Moshkalova A.,
Master student of the University of International Business
Secondary School #80 Zhaissan 22 Zhacheva Ye.
Senior teacher of the language center of the University of International Business. Specialist
8A Abay avenue, Almaty https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6540015
Abstract
This study attempts to discuss a variety of CLT activities contributing to oral production. CLT approach is the main tool for fostering near-authentic atmosphere in EFL classrooms. The goal is to study CLT approach using a literature review and to identify more useful activities to improve speaking fluency. This article considers information gap activities and fluency techniques as the most effective ones to develop productive skills and improve fluent speech in English.
Keywords: CLT activities, fluency, information-gap activities, opinion-gap activities, reasoning-gap activities.
Speaking is an important aspect of learning and teaching a second language. Despite its importance, teaching speaking has been devalued for several years, and English language teachers have remained teaching speaking as a series of drills or dialogue memorization. However, nowadays the purpose of teaching speaking must be to increase students' communicative abilities, because only then will students be able to express themselves and learn how to obey the social and cultural rules that apply to each communicative situation.
For humans, the most important role of language is to communicate meaningfully with one another; people should first grasp the language spoken among themselves in order to transmit their content and intention. Because humans are social creatures, they require communication. This communication might take place in two ways: orally and in writing. The emphasis on spoken form, which is the primary interest of the researchers in this study. Because speaking is the most fundamental necessity of human interaction, majority individuals view the capacity to speak a language to be equivalent with understanding the target language (Celce-Murcia, 2001). Speech is the essential initial instrument of communication for expressing information, sentiments, ideas, emotions and opinions, hence it is the primary skill in the language arts. When learning the second language, this suggests that speaking comes first, much before writing or reading. According to Abdallah and Mansour (2015), second language acquisition necessitates a focus on oral communication, actual usages, and contextual-pragmatic procedures. Reading and writing are also crucial in advanced language level since they improve eloquence and understanding, but speaking takes priority. EFL students find it particularly challenging to speak a language because successful verbal communication necessitates the capacity to utilize the language effectively in social relationships. Not just verbal communication, but also par-alinguistic components of speech like tone, stress, and
intonation contribute to interaction richness. Nonlin-guistic aspects such as body language, gestures and facial expression, may either support speech or transmit signals directly without speech (Brown, 1994: quoted in Cunningham, 1999).
Overall, we can infer that speaking ability is noteworthy of bringing up the newly created problem of task-based approach, information-gap activities and opinion-gap activities that have the potential to have a significant impact on the development of speaking skills.
Speaking skill includes fluency and accuracy, but this study deals with defining the importance of improving fluency in FLT. The term "fluent" means a speaker is able to use the correct structures of a language at normal speed, which means speaking naturally with concentration on the content delivery, rather than focusing on the form or structure of a language. Fillmore (1979) defines four abilities of speaking fluently:
a) the ability to talk at length with few pauses;
b) be able to state the sentences coherently and se-mantically;
c) have appropriate expressions in a wide range of contexts;
d) be creative and imaginative in language use.
The most effective approach in teaching speaking
fluency of foreign language is CLT. Communicative language teaching can be interpreted as a series of activities which involve interaction between learners, develop learner's autonomy, connect different subject curriculum and strive to search for meaning through content. Teachers become co-learners and use multiple forms of assessment like observation, interviews, journals, portfolios may be invoked to construct a comprehensive picture of what learners can do in second language acquisition studies. The following types of CLT activities are the most popular types among English language teachers (Richards, 2006).
In CLT, one of the most important aspects of communication seems to be the idea of gathering clarification. It means that in real-life communication, people typically encourage conversation in order to gain information, and this is referred to as an information gap. An information-gap task is a technique in which learners are missing the needed information to complete a task or solve a problem, and they have to communicate with their classmates to fill in the gaps (Larsen-Freeman, 2003). If students use language structures for their own purposes and utilize their speaking and listening abilities with the goal of obtaining information, more real conversation may occur in the classroom. As a result, they will use suitable language, grammar, and communication techniques to complete a task.
The concept of information gap is an important part of communication in CLT. This relates to the reality that most individuals communicate in real life to obtain information they do not possess. If students utilize their linguistic and communicative resources to get information rather than practicing language forms, more real conversation is likely to occur in the classroom. They will use available language, grammar, and communication skills to perform a task in this way. The information-gap principle is used in the following exercises:
A-B pairings of students are formed. Two sets of pictures have been duplicated by the teacher. A group of people is presented in one set (for A students). The other set (for B students) has an image that is comparable to the A-picture but with a few minor variations. Students must sit back to back and ask questions to determine the number of differences between the two pictures.
Information-gap activities include jigsaw activities. The class is usually divided into several groups that each have a set of content needed to perform a task. To complete an assignment, students must fit the parts together. As a result, individuals should put their language skills to good use in order to communicate effectively and engage in meaningful effective communication.
In pairs, students do a role play. One student is provided the information she or he needs to play the position of a tourist agent who possesses information about suggested tours to different countries and other details. The other requires information about tourist destinations, what activities they offer, how to reach that destination, costs, and so on. They act out the scene without ever looking at each other's cue cards.
Harmer (2012, quoted from Anna Kusnierek, 2015) divides information gap activities into open and closed information activities. The open information gap activities enable learners to apply variety of linguistic structures while the second one have some restrictions in employing certain language items. These activities are focused on meaningful language use where teachers are supposed not to interfere the speaking that is in progress, thus they do not get learners confused and encourage them to communicate freely.
Kowalska, (1991, quoted from Anna Kusnierek, 2015) studied the importance of role-plays and came to conclusion that role-plays much more contributed to
speaking fluency owing that this activity required rehearsals beforehand. Moreover, learners' creativity and imagination skills could be enhanced in parallel as well as facilitating to build good interactions between learners which prepare them to future life. Role-plays are closely related to information gap activities for the reason that role-cards are derived from them enabling learners to plan their conversation drawing on the information given in cards. Therefore, we cannot deny the benefits of information gap activities as well as role-plays in improving speaking fluency.
Task completion tasks such as puzzles, games, and map reading are linked to objectives that emphasize on how students use their linguistic knowledge. Students' ability to collect information is required for activities such as student-led surveys, interviews, and investigations.
Considering values, attitudes, and thoughts is an example of an opinion-sharing activity in which students evaluate tasks in order of significance that they are inclined to consider. Participants are asked to give knowledge in a different form from the initial form when completing information-transfer activities. Opinion-gap task requires the learners to give their own personal preference, feeling, or attitude to complete a task (Fallahi, Aziz Malayeri, & Bayat, 2015). For example, a social problem such as "unemployment" can be given to the learners and be asked to give their ideas on how to tackle it. Also they should read instructions on how to get from point A to point B and then construct a map or building based on the given data to illustrate a graph.
Opinion-gap activities contribute to learners' oral production as they have opportunities to express thoughts to complete tasks. For example, teachers pose challenges closely related to most people's lives and ask learners to find suitable solutions discussing them in groups. Another activity may be to write a letter of advice to a friend who has to seek for help for his problem. The opinion-gap task requires students to provide their own ideas in addition to the information provided. The opinion gap exercise, which challenges students to communicate their own meanings and is open-ended and shared, has proven to be effective in developing negotiation (Ellis, 2003, p. 89).
Getting some information from provided information through practical reasoning and the decision-making process are examples of reasoning-gap tasks. For example, arranging a teacher's schedule in accordance with class schedules. Reasoning-gap task refers to the new information that are derived by the students through inference, deduction, practical reasoning, or perception of relationships or patterns (Prabhu, 1987). He believed that tasks should involve learners in "reasoning"-making connections between the information. Through requiring the leaners to provide reasons while learning new materials we as teachers can help them to learn English language better.
The majority of language teaching methods may be classified as 'form-based.' Task-based learning (TBL) differs from form-based learning in that it specifies a sequence of communicative activities to be completed in the target language rather than a sequence of
language lessons (Nunan, 2002). A task-based approach strives to give students a realistic setting in which to utilize language. Learners have several opportunities to interact while they strive to finish a task. Learners must try to comprehend one other and communicate their own ideas in this type of contact, which is considered to aid language development (Candlin & Murphy, 1987: cited in Bygate, 1999). Task-oriented lingo Instruction is amongst the most successful and meaningful ways to language teaching in recent decades, focusing on learning via doing and doing things with language. Task-based language instruction is advocated by communicative language teaching (Freeman, 2003).
Based on the type of cognitive activity, Prabhu (1987: quoted in Rod Ellis) differentiates three main categories of tasks:
1. Activities that need students to exchange pieces of information in order to accomplish a task are known as information gap tasks.
2. Opinion gap activities require students to consider and express individual preferences, sentiments or attitudes in order to perform a task.
3. Learners must infer new information from previously supplied material in order to complete reasoning gap tasks
Fluency is an integral part of speaking, so they should be considered as a whole. Nation, (1989) took a high interest in researching fluency. Amount of pauses and fillers in a speech characterize about to what extent the speech is fluent. Having done several researches he came to conclusion that repetitions and rehearsals were the best way to improve speaking for the reason that familiar content and familiar structures repeated for several times increased the speed of speech. His famous activity is known as 4-3-2 technique which is regarded as the effective one. The first time learners tell their partners familiar story in a period of 4 minutes and then change their roles to listen to each other. During the second circle learners recount that story to each other in turns for 3 minutes. The third time it should be done in a period of 2 minutes. Thus, fluency can be gained efficiently. Furthermore, working in pairs boost learners' confidence fostering a safe environment in language classrooms. Since, fluency activities are mostly oriented in developing oral production as well as flow of speech, accuracy here is not the main focus. When talking about speaking fluently some grammatical mistakes can be made in any case.
Another activity recommended by Nation and Newtan, (2009) is called "Pyramid procedure" which contributes to public speaking skills. This activity can be used at any level of learning a foreign language. The first thing what learners need to do is preparation of
speech for a certain topic and to present it before his/her peer which is followed by getting feedback from that peer. Secondly, they deliver a speech in groups and they provide feedback in order to improve speaking fluency. Third cycle contains delivering a speech in front the whole class using only a few notes, and as a result, this activity increases learners' abilities to speak a foreign language confidently.
In short, implementing various tasks in the language classroom (opinion-gap, reasoning-gap, information-gap and fluency activities) can expose EFL learners to near-authentic language practice. As previously stated, EFL learners' speaking fluency improves when they are exposed to information-gap activities and fluency techniques. EFL learners receive more language input and produce more output as a result of applying these activities. That is, they strive to use their language skills to communicate their intentions in order to improve their speaking fluency.
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