Today we're talking about developing your English speaking skills I'm Dierdre
Nicholas from palm tree teaching TV teacher speaker and your personal
English language coach now whether you're an english learner or an English
teacher I bet that one of the things that you would most like to be good at
is speaking if you're a teacher you'd like some refreshing ideas on how to get
your students to talk more English in class and how to teach speaking
effectively and if you're a learner you want some activities that are fun and
that you can easily do at home either on your own or with a friend or with a
small group of friends to really supercharge your English don't you so
much better than studying a grammar book and so much better for your speaking
skills too so in this video I'm going to share with you some activities that will
really improve your English communication to provide opportunities
to practice language in social contexts to use English to express yourself or
get your students to express themselves and to improve speech sounds rhythm
pronunciation and intonation as well as developing all the vocabulary you need
for real-life situations of course the best way to improve your speaking skills
is to get lots of listening and speaking practice which is exactly what you'll
get with these activities now for each of these activities I'm going to show
you how to do them as a learner at home easily and also as a teacher with your
class so here's the first one playing cards surprised how come playing cards
be used as a language tool very easily so at home you just need one friend or
up to three friends of course to do this press elect a different topic for each
suit of cards so for example it could be diamonds for travel hearts for
relationships and family spades for a memory and clubs for
money and jobs of course you can pick whatever topic you want get a pack of
cards and get each person to choose a card now depending on what suit the
person has chosen they should write down four or five questions about that topic
now don't allow them to prepare questions that could be answered with
yes or no just because that won't actually get the conversations going
what they need to do is to prepare WH questions and how who what where when
because that will really open up the answers then each person asks their
questions that they prepared to the others really gets the conversations
going in class it's done in the same way but put your students into groups of
four and each group has to pick a card when the students start to ask the
questions mix up the groups okay so number two my
second activity to develop your English speaking skills is role plays and
simulations this is great at home or in class in class this is one of the best
ways of getting your students to speak English and it's motivating as well
students pretend that they're in varying different social contexts depending on
the theme of your lesson of course you as the teacher give information to each
student so who they are what they do how they feel what they're thinking that
kind of thing so for example you can tell a student okay you are John you
have a stomachache you go to the doctor and you tell him how you feel and what
happened and so on now if you have a large class you could get a small group
to do a demonstration at the front of the class and you'd be like a theatre
production and then you can get all the other students to ask them questions you
can extend these role plays into simulations to make it even more fun now
this is where they bring in things to add to their role and make them more
lifelike role plays and see relations are really fun for your
students it will help them to learn the vocabulary and remember it much better
at home you can make this into a fun event as well perhaps for your children
you could have a whole themed children's party where they have to do role plays
and simulations in English or you can invite your friends round for a dinner
and get them to bring things along for a themed dinner make them act in a role
throughout the whole dinner all in English
number three English only days now if you're an English Learner why not
involve your family in learning English particularly brothers and sisters
perhaps if they're learning English as well or your parents or someone in the
family and create an english-only day at home where no one can speak anything but
English you can do the same in class every time a student wants to ask a
question they have to do it in English number four picture describing pictures
can be very effective at stimulating speaking and in a fun way
there are loads of ways to do this in class you could get your students to
bring in pictures or photographs or something they're particularly
interested in like for example a computer game or a football game and
then they can tell their partner or a group all about it you could mix the
groups around and perhaps get a spokesperson from one group to share
pictures with another group endless possibilities but what about as a
learner at home well this is very easily done now if you've watched many of my
videos you'll know that I'm a great fan of talking to yourself so talk to
yourself what talk to me yes talk to me but what should I say well you could
start by watching my videos practice all the phrases and the sentences and the
tongue twisters that sounds like a great idea I'm gonna start right now
particularly talking to yourself in the mirror and recording your spoken English
as a way of improving it really works you can learn so much about your
strengths and what you need to work on by listening to a recording of yourself
so at home select a picture of something that you really like perhaps a
photograph of your friends or a picture of a beautiful garden and then turn on
the record button on your mobile phone and record what you say listen to
yourself afterwards you can learn a lot from that
oh so before I go on to the next activity to help you develop your
speaking skills don't forget to hit the subscribe button and click on the bell
so you don't miss any of my videos and lessons and if you would like to have me
as your personal English language coach why not email me on the email below
deirdre at palm tree teaching comm I can really help you to improve your English
speaking fluency okay number five desert island activity this is a fun
activity for you and a couple of friends if you're an English Learner
perhaps over a coffee or a lunch of the weekend it's also great for teachers and
can be done with large classes too especially if you divide your class into
groups give each person a piece of paper tell them to draw an object on it
anything then collect in the drawings from your students or your friends and
then hand them out so the drawings go to different people
then you set the scene you and your friends or you and your class have been
stranded on a desert island tell your students that
anything they have is the object which is drawn on the paper material their
task is to persuade the class or their group that to survive the glass needs
that item the winners are the ones which persuade the class that they need that
item to survive on their desert island you could have half the classes winners
that way number six who's telling the truth now
this is a variation on two truths and a lie
but it's more fun gets more English practice in conversation and it creates
competition again it's an activity that you can do with friends if you're a
learner or in class so you have each person write three facts about
themselves that nobody else in the class knows on a piece of paper make sure each
student puts their name on the top of the paper then collect in the papers and
select three students to come to the front of the room read aloud one of the
facts that is true for one of the students all three claim that that fact
is theirs and the class has to proceed to ask questions to all three to find
out which one is telling the truth and which one is lying after a few minutes
of questioning the students guess who is telling the truth you could do this as a
competition in groups and offer little prizes as well so I've got lots of
videos which I made to support you as an English Learner and also lots that
support you as an English teacher as well so do have a look at those I've put
some links below this video for you in the description i hope you've really
enjoyed this video don't forget to Like comment share and subscribe to this
amazing Channel so enjoy your English and your English teaching and I will see
you next time bye