Speaking skills include fluency, comprehension, vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, etc. Developing them could take time for a new language learner; however, a few activities can ease the burden. These include:
Partner Practice
Several games like Taboo, Bingo, and running dictation can improve speaking skills between two or more adults and children. Taboo requires a teammate to guess the word without stating any of the words mentioned on a card. It is fun with more players and can also build stronger relationships between partners.
Similarly, running dictation involves writing the text spoken by the reader. The team that writes the most text that is closer to the reader’s dictation in a minute or any other time interval is the winner. Besides this, adults can have a healthy discussion or a debate on world topics. It requires a person to counter the opposer’s statements and can improve their speaking skills as they say more.
Another method could include role-plays and dialogues. These come very handily in a classroom. A tutor can ask a group of students to learn the part of a character in a play. Each of them could play different acts or characters. Once the students finish with their role-play, a tutor can point out improvement areas. Role-play can also involve students in thinking in a group about a new story and their characters.
One of the best and most exciting games with a group of students is Pictionary. A student must draw a picture on a given card, and his/her teammates need to guess it in a given time interval. Besides this, a teacher can also conduct an activity of the “I-Spy” game, wherein a student has to come forward and spot the tangible items visible to him/her. Teachers can ask the speaker to narrate using a descriptive vocabulary and adjectives. The team that spots the most while complying with the game rules becomes the winner.
Making use of practical vocabulary activities could prove useful. One such game is the hot potato game. It involves speaking a word related to an object passed to other students in a circle. The person holding the object must speak a new word within three seconds or gets outside it.
The hot potato game can become more challenging if the referee adds non-repetition of spoken words. However, some rules like speaking about familiar objects other than the passed around one can make the game easier. The game increases thinking ability, attentiveness, listening, and speaking skills.
Another exciting method could be storytelling a situation. The idea would cater to narrate a story or situation given by the teacher. For example, you receive high marks in a paper and want to share your delight with your favorite friend(s). Another situation sample could involve stating a lousy day at the office to your wife or husband. The activity would enhance creativity and emotions besides listening and speaking skills.
Self-Learning
Although YouTube and other video streaming apps can prove very useful in improving speaking skills or learning a new language, there are a few things a person can do more. One of them involves reading a passage from an article, book, magazine, or newspaper aloud and recording the voice. After that, the person can listen to his/her narration and figure out the mistakes.
Besides this, one can also take an Oxford dictionary and pronounce the words written in the brackets. By doing so, the person would increase vocabulary and speaking skills. Moreover, he/she would understand the common word pronunciation practices of a language.
Additionally, watching a movie, listening to the radio or a podcast, attending a theatre, etc. can prove useful to learn and understand speaking skills. The more a person practices these self-learning activities, the more he/she can speak better and learn faster.
Another habit could involve communicating in the said language with most of the people in your daily lives. Furthermore, self-learning activities like online english speaking course, interview topics, mimicking, filter extraction, etc. can assess and enhance speaking skills.
For example, filter extraction activity would include recognizing filters – “like”, “um”, “uh”, “so”, “right”. Removing them from your routine conversations and recording practices can flow to your thinking and speaking skills. Similarly, mimicking an actor, public speaker, or public figure can help learn new words and improve their pronunciation.
Filter extraction activity would also help to come across inspirational role models. A learner can choose any role models and try to achieve the same or higher speaking skills level. Repetition is also an interesting activity for self-learners. It would include choosing a passage and reading it as many times as possible.
Repetition would make one fluent with similar types of words or phrases. Once you become familiar with the paragraph, you could also enact it in different expressions to make it more interesting.
