SKKN ome activities to help grade 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang lower secondary school develop speaking skill in extra lesson in the afternoon

Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.

EDUCATION AND TRAINING BUREAU OF DO LUONG
LY NHAT QUANG LOWER SECONDARY SCHOOL
******************

EXPERIENCE AND INNOVATION
THEME:
SOME ACTIVITIES TO HELP
GRADE- 7 STUDENTS AT
LY NHAT QUANG LOWER
SECONDARY SCHOOL
DEVELOP SPEAKING SKILL
IN EXTRA LESSONS IN THE
AFTERNOON
SUBJECT: ENGLISH
Teacher: Dang Quang Tam
Tel: 0976808268
Group: Social Science
School year: 2013-2014
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.

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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking

skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
TABLE OF CONTENT
A. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND.
B. PRACTICAL BACKGROUND.
C. SOLUTIONS
I. Pair- work on topics given.
II. Report.
III. Picture description.
IV. Retelling story .
V. Discussion:
VI. Interview.
VII. Table completion.
D. CONCLUSION

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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
A. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND.
English, an international language, has been a compulsory subject at secondary
schools in Vietnam in the past few years. All students want to learn English well to
have a better future. Along with improving grammar, students need to improve their
language skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing. For me, the main target of
learning a foreign language is to communicate with people who cannot speak our
mother tongue.
Communication is divided into two forms- speaking and writing. In real life,
when speaking, people express their emotions, feelings more easily than writing
because people can use their facial expressions, gestures as well as body language.
Speaking is "the process of building and sharing meaning through the use of

verbal and non-verbal symbols, in a variety of contexts" (Chaney, 1998, p. 13)
Because of the importance of speaking skill, I personally think that all teachers
of English mustn't neglect the importance of teaching students how to speak English
sensibly.
Speaking is a crucial part of foreign language learning and teaching. Despite its
importance, for many years, teaching speaking has been undervalued and English
language teachers have continued to teach speaking just as a repetition of drills or
memorization of dialogues. However, today's world requires that the goal of teaching
speaking should improve students' communicative skills, because, only in that way,
students can express themselves and learn how to follow the social and cultural rules
appropriate in each communicative circumstance. In order to teach foreign language
learners how to speak in sensible ways, some speaking activities are provided below,
that can be applied to English as a foreign language classroom settings, together with
suggestions for teachers who teach oral language.
When teaching speaking, we all know some common activities such as
Discussions; Role Play; Simulation; Information Gap; Brainstorming; Storytelling;
Interviews; Story Completion; Reporting; Picture Narrating; Picture Describing;
Find the Difference.
However, if students, especially grade 7 - student, want to perform the activities
mentioned above, they need to acquire a quite a large range of vocabulary and
grammar. In addition, to enable students to perform above activities, teachers have to
create interesting, sensible speaking activities so that all students can feel relaxed
when involving the activities. Teachers also need to motivate students by giving them
good encouragement, compliments.

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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.

B. PRACTICAL BACKGROUND.
In fact, very few students can speak English fluently after studying it for 4
years at lower secondary school. I have observed some of colleagues' teaching lessons
and through observation, I have realized some difficulties that teachers and students
have.
1. To teachers:
- In most of extra lessons in the afternoon, teachers just help their students do
grammar exercises, reading, writing and listening. They ignore speaking skill so day
by day, month by month and year by year, students find it really hard to speak English
though they can understand what other people speak in English in a simple way.
- Some teachers cannot create speaking activities for students to take part in or they
are not creative in designing activities.
- Some teachers don't make models so that students cannot imitate. Some teachers
don't have enough teaching aids like pictures, real objects .....for students to express
their ideas.
2. To students:
- Many students are not confident to present their ideas in English though they can
understand what other students and their teachers say.
- Many students are not motivated to speak English and are afraid of making mistakes
and being laughed at by their friends or being told off by their teachers.
- Many students just want to learn new grammar structures because they are new to
them. They don't want to speak what they have learnt. By learning many grammar
structures, they can get good marks in final exam, which only test students'
knowledge of grammar mainly.
With experience of teaching English for more than 12 years, I still find it rather
hard to design speaking activities so that all students can get involved. So, I have tried
many methods and then I can learn what I have done with a class and then I can
improve in other classes.
3. Advantages and disadvantages when applying my experiences and innovations.
a. Advantages:

- I am a young teacher so I am always enthusiastic with my English teaching job and I
always want to find something new, interesting for my students. My love for my
lovely students is also a kind of motivation for me to try my best to help them.
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
- Many of my students are eager to learn how to speak English well so that they can
communicate with foreigners when they have chance.
- More and more students and their parents are aware of the importance of speaking
skill.
- My collogues as well as other teachers in my school always give me good
encouragement and support.
b. Disadvantages:
- When I applied my experiences and innovations, I also have some certain
difficulties as following:
- The number of students who can speak English and wants to improve their speaking
skill is very limited.
- My experience is more or less still limited.
- Teaching aids and time are also a big problem as I still need more time and teaching
aids to prepare a contented lesson for extra class in the afternoon.
- Quite a few students are too weak to speak English as they don't know much
lexicology as well as lacking grammar structures.
- The number of students in a class is still big while we can't move chairs and desks as
the way we want.
C. SOLUTIONS
To help my students improve their speaking skill, I can't do it in a day or two. On the
contrary, it took me months, even years to draw some following experiences and
innovations.

I. Pair- work on topics given.
Aim: To help students ask and answer using questions from brainstorming stage to
create communicative activities.
Time to carry out: 20 minutes.
Preparation:
+ Teacher: Vocabulary of jobs, good questions to explore personal information.
+ Students: Get to know some information about the person they want to act.
1. Asking and answering about personal information.
As we know, teachers of English often ask their students to work in pair asking and
answering about their personal because this activity is quite important and interesting.
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Last semester, after students have learnt Units 1,2,3 in English 7, in an extra
lesson in the afternoon, I asked students in class 7 B to work in pair asking and
answering about their personal information. I gave them some clues such as: name,
age, job, accommodation, family, telephone number, favorite pastimes. I also
reminded students some phrases to ask their friends back to increase the
communicative target. Such as:
How/ What about you?
And you?
And your....
For weak class, I asked all class to build up the questions before they asked each
other. Questions as following:
What's your name?
How old are you?
Where do you live?
How far is it from your house to school?

How do you go to school?
How many people are there in your family?
What's your telephone number?
What do you do in your free time?
Unluckily, I found my students feel quite bored with this activity because they
did learn how to answer these questions in the morning so during their working time,
I walked around to take notes what their answers were.
First, I asked all students in class to work in pairs simultaneously and then I
required some pairs to present their dialogues in front of the whole class.
Here are some of the dialogues I noted down during that lesson.
* First, I heard two students called Huyen and Quyen make their dialogue as
following:
Huyen: What's your name?
Quyen: My name is Quyen.
Huyen: How old are you?
Quyen: I'm 11 years old.
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Huyen: What do you do?
Quyen: I'm a student.
Huyen: Where do you live?
Quyen: I live in Da Son
Huyen: How far is it from your house to school?
Quyen: It's about 1 km.
Huyen: How do you go to school?
Quyen: I go to school by bike.
Huyen: How many people are there in your family?

Quyen: There are four people in my family.
Huyen: What's your telephone number?
Quyen: 0383 871 256
Huyen: What do you do in your free time?
Quyen: I play badminton.
Obviously, two students named Huyen and Quyen made a good dialogue
because they could use all questions needed to ask about personal information. But
they still felt bored with this activity since they have been in the same class for nearly
two years and they have known each other very well. That's why when listening to
Quyen's answer, Huyen showed no surprise or not much interest because she could
guess what Quyen's answers were.
* Next, I observed 2 students named Nam and Hai
Nam: What's your name, Hai?
Hai: My name is Hai. And your name, Nam?
Nam: My name is Nam. How old are you?
Hai: I'm 11 years old. And you?
Nam: I'm 11. What do you do?
Hai: I'm a student. And you?
Nam: I'm a student. Where do you live?
Hai: I live in Do Luong town. How about you?
Nam: I live in Do Luong town. How far is it from your house to school?
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Hai: It's about 2 km. How about your house?
Nam: It's about 2 km. How do you go to school?
Hai: I goto school by bike. And you?
Nam: I go to school by bike. How many people are there in your family?

Hai: There are four people in my family. And your family?
Nam: There are five people in my family. What's your telephone number?
Hai: 0383 871 345. And your telephone number?
Nam: 0383 871 254. What do you do in your free time?
Hai: I play soccer. And you?
Nam: I watch TV.
Happily, two students Nam and Hai made a better dialogue than Huyen and
Quyen's because they did use phrases like: How about you? And you? .....to ask his
friend but they still found this activity a bit uninteresting because they were neighbors
and they knew clearly about each other. They knew each other so clearly that they
made a very funny mistake when asking questions:
Nam: What's your name, Hai?
Hai: My name is Hai. And your name, Nam?
From the dialogues students in class 7B made, I thought I had to find a better
way, a more interesting thing but students can still have to practice asking and
answering personal information without feeling bored. So when I taught class 7 D (a
weaker class), I also asked the whole class to build up questions as I did in class 7 B.
The I asked students to act if they were new to each other. So each student have three
minutes to note down the name, job, accommodation.......they liked. They may act if
they were famous singers, actors or actress............. Then I asked students in class 7D
to change their seats so that they could ask the person they wanted to know more. I
also reminded students to use phrases given to ask his/ her new friend to increase
communicative target and encouraged them to be creative in using questions.
And here are two dialogues I noted down:
(Dialogue made by Sang and Duc. Duc is A. Sang is B)
A: Hi. Nice to meet you.
B: Hi. How do you do. What's your name?
A: My name is Messi. And your name?
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
B: My full name is Ngo Kien Huy. How old are you?
A: I'm 27 years old. How about you?
B: I'm 24. What do you do?
A: I'm a soccer player. And you?
B: I'm a singer. Where do you live?
A: I live in London. And you?
B: I live in Ho Chi Minh city. How do you often go to work?
A: I go to work by bus. How about you?
B: I go to work by car, sometimes by bus. How many people are there in your family?
A: There are three people in my family. How about your family.
B: There are two people in my family. My mother and I. So what do you so in your
free time?
A: I play basketball. Sometimes I go swimming. And you?
B: I sometimes play video games. Sometimes, I play table tennis.
With the way I used for students in class 7D, I found that all students were
eager to work together to make dialogues. Although they couldn't cover all personal
information needed, their dialogues were more colorful and more lively. Therefore, to
motivate students first to feel like taking part in speaking activity, then gradually to
improve their speaking skill as well as their confidence, teachers really need to create
artificial activities which are new and interesting to them and above all, teachers have
to create activities that are suitable for students' levels.
Pair- work in teaching and learning English is not new and can be called a daily
activity but how teachers make students get involved in this kind of activity eagerly is
a big problem to many teachers.
With the way I used for students in class 7 D can be used in many lessons with
other topics relating to exploring personal information.
2. Pair- work about future plan using "will"

Aim: - To help students express their future intention using "will" after learning
Unit 2.
- To help students exchange information about their plan as well as revising the
use of "will" and develop speaking skill.
Time to carry out: 20 minutes.
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Preparation:
+ Teachers: Information / flashcards about places of interest in their province or
country. Questions to ask about holiday in the future.
+ Students: Revise the use, form of "will" at home first.
Steps:
When I taught class 7 B. First, I asked students to speak out some questions to
ask their friends about their plans for a holiday next summer. Here are questions
students in class 7B presented.
Where will you go next summer?
How will you go there?
Who will you go with?
Where will you stay there?
How long will you stay there?
What will you do there?
Will you buy any souvenirs and take any photos?
Then, I asked all students to work in pair simultaneously. I walked around class to
check and help but I found that most of students in class 7B said they would go to
Cua Lo as they hadn't been to anywhere else and they didn't know much about other
famous places. Therefore, their dialogues were almost the same. They didn't talk
about other places as I expected. When I carried out the same lesson in class 7A, I

asked students to say out the place they wanted to visit such as Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh
city....., then I provided some information about those places.
you can get there by car/ bus/ train / plane (from Vinh city)
Hanoi:

you can visit: Sword lake, One Pillar pagoda, Ho Chi Minh's
Mausoleum, Ba Dinh Square,......
you can try: Hanoi Pho, Com cakes, ......

Similarly, I provided some flashcards containing some necessary information about
some places to my students so that they can use.
After students had worked simultaneously, I asked some pairs to present their
dialogues and I was very glad to find that some pairs made very good dialogues. Here
is one of those.
I noted down a dialogue between Hoang and Nhung as following:
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Hoang: Hi, NHung. Where will you go this summer?
Nhung: I will go to Ho Chi Minh city.
Hoang: How nice! Who will you go with?
Nhung: I will go with my parents and my brother.
Hoang: How will you go there?
Nhung: We will go there by train.
Hoang: Where will you stay in Ho Chi Minh city?
Nhung: We will stay at a small hotel.
Hoang: How long will you stay there?
Nhung: We will stay there for a week.

Hoang: What will you do in Ho Chi Minh city?
Nhung: We will visit Nha Rong Harbor, Dam Sen Water Park, Tien Spring park and
go to a music live show. And we'll try a lot of specialties in Ho Chi Minh city.
Hoang: Will you buy any souvenirs and take any photos?
Nhung: Of course, we will. I will have a gift for you and I will show you my photos.
Hoang: Great. Have a good trip.
Nhung. Thanks. How about you?
Hoang: This summer, I will go to Hanoi with my parents. We'll go there by bus. We'll
stay at my uncle's house for 4 days. I think we will visit you can visit: Sword lake,
One Pillar pagoda, Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum, Ba Dinh Square,......And we'll try
Hanoi Pho, Com cakes, ......We'll take some photos and buy some gifts. I'll give you a
nice gift.
Nhung: Thanks. Enjoy your journey.
Once again, if teachers want their students to be interested in speaking
activities, they have to create new, interesting and suitable ones. Moreover, to be
successful in one activity, teachers must have good knowledge in that filed and
prepare what is essential to help students in case they get stuck in exploring
information.
Application:

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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
All teachers of English have known the importance of pair work in learning
English so they can use this type of activity whenever they want to help their students
to speak.
II. Report.
Report is also an excellent way for students to improve their speaking skill as

well was their confidence because if one wants to report something, he will have to
stand up in front of class to do it.
In order to have a good report activity, teachers need to set tasks to students
before asking them to report something. Report activity is often used after pair work.
Teachers also need to provide cards so that students can take notes.
After students in class 7 B finished their open pairs (asking and answering
about personal information), I asked some students to come to black board to talk
about themselves and about a friend he has talked with. Unfortunately, many students
can't remember information about their friends, some even forget information about
themselves. Furthermore, all students in class 7B have known each other very well so
they were not interested to hear about their friends.
When I carried out pair- work activity about personal information in class 7 D,
I had some more experience so before I asked students to adapt their role, I drew a
table as below and asked them to fill in during their discussion. Students first fill in
information in column (me) then ask a friend to fill in column (My new friend) but
not to write anything in column (My online friend)
Name

(me) Huy

(My new
Messi

Age

27
singer

soccer player

Accommodation

Ho Chi Minh London
city

Family

two people

.......................

24

Job

friend) (My online friend)

Means of transport car/ bus
In free time

three people
bus

play
video play basketball,
games,
play swimming.
table tennis

go

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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Once students have had their new information about them and about their new
friends, their report is much better.
Here is a report presented by a student named Sang in class 7 D.
Hello everyone. Nice to meet you today. My name is Huy. I'm 27 years old and I'm a
singer. I live in Ho Chi Minh city with my mother. I work in a studio and I often go to
work by car. Sometimes, I go by bus. In my free time, I play video games, play table
tennis.
Messi is my new friend. He is 24 years old and he a soccer player. He lives in London
with his parents. He goes to work by bus. In his free time, he plays basketball, goes
swimming.
With this report, we can see, it is short but quite informative about a person and
I think it's good if a grade-7 students can report like this.
During, Sang and other's reports, I told other students (listeners) to listen to
their friends carefully and fill in column (My online friend) about a person they like.
By doing this, I found that all students listened to their friends' report attentively,
partly because their friends now are different (famous people) and partly I would call
some students at random to report about themselves and about a person they have just
taken notes about. And happily, class was surprisingly quiet, we could hear only the
presenter's voice, no Vietnamese was used during the report.
I also used this way of report when teaching class 7 B and 7 A to talk about
their future plans using "will". I found all students were eager to listen to their friends'
report and concentrate on their lesson much better than ever before.
III. Picture description.
Picture description is a very good activity for students to improve their

speaking skill in extra lessons because in extra lessons, students have more time to
speak and they can speak about their own pictures, not only pictures given by their
teachers.
1. Describing houses.
Aim: To help students revise vocabulary and structures of describing a house and talk
about their house or a house they know. (There is / There are..)
Time to carry out: 20 minutes.
Preparation: vocabulary on houses and main things in a house, pictures of houses,
three small presents.

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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
After learning Unit 3 (At home- English 7), In an extra lesson, I asked students
in class 7C to describe their house but they did not come up to my expectation
because most of the house they describe were so similar. They just described their
own house so there was nothing special as most of their houses were small ones in the
countryside.
Realizing that better descriptions should be made, Therefore, before I taught
students in class 7 A, I asked a teacher of Fine Art who also teaches class 7A to help
me. That is, in her Fine Art lesson, she asked each student to draw a house they dream
to have in the future. Luckily, pictures of houses they drew were so amazing. I asked
the teacher of Fine Art to lend me those pictures and when I taught class 7 A the topic
"Describing a house", I delivered their pictures to them and told them to present their
description. With the help from own pictures, students were eager to show off their
pictures and fluently talked about their houses in dream. After students have finished
their talk, I asked students to choose the most beautiful house and a present was given
to the owner of that house and a gift for the best description was given and a gift for

the best presenter. No one can guess how happy the students in class were!
IV. Retelling story .
Aim: To help students develop their speaking skill and talk about past events using
past simple tense.
Time to carry out: 20 minutes
Preparation: Pictures of past events, vocabulary of holiday, table of irregular verbs
if necessary.
Story completion a quite difficult activity for grade 7 but if the teachers can prepare
enough picture cues, they can do surprisingly well.
Basing on pictures about the Robinsons in Unit 9- English 7, before I taught
class 7C , I asked students and I myself prepared some similar pictures so that
students could use to retell their story of a holiday they enjoyed.
V. Discussion:
Aim: To help students have a discussion on a quite difficult topic. Students can have
a chance to develop their speaking skill and express their personal points of view.
Time to carry out: about 15 minutes
Preparation: + Teacher: prepare some advantages / disadvantages of living the city
and in the country.
+ Students: prepare some advantages / disadvantages of living in the
city/ country.
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Three years ago, when I taught class 7 A, after they had learnt part B- Unit 15. I asked
them to discuss where they liked to live. I used two questions: Do you like the city?
Why/ Why not? Do you like the countryside? Why / Why not?
First, I asked them to take note reasons why they liked the country or the city
on their own. Then I asked them to use the questions above to ask their friends. But

unfortunately, students could present very few reasons. So when I taught class 7D, I
changed the way before discussion.
Before their discussion, I asked all students to present some reasons why they
liked the city and the country. All students were interested in giving their ideas. Then
I asked students to discuss and present their ideas. Although some students just picked
up some ideas, the reasons they used were sensible.
VI. Interview.
Interview is an interesting activity for students to develop their speaking skill in
front of other people.
Aim: To help students know how to use some questions to interview other people
(famous people)
Time to carry out: 20 minutes
Preparation: + Teacher: Pictures / information about some famous people such as
scientists, inventors, singers....
+ Students: Pictures and information about their idol.
When I first used this activity in class 7C after students had learnt part BFamous People (Unit 16) three years ago, I let students interview their friends who
acted as famous people but I found that the questions students used were not sensible
and they made some funny mistake like: Where were you born?
Who born you? / When did you die? or some questions relating too detailed personal
information such as: How many children do you have? / How much money do you
have? Then I asked some pairs to interview their idol in front of class, they did not
know how to introduce them and start or end their conversation naturally.
When I taught class 7 D, before students carried out their interview, I asked the
whole class to brainstorm some good questions to interview some famous people.
Then I wrote down the questions on the board for students to put them in good order
for an interview.
Some questions about Thomas Edison as following:
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
When and where were you born?
What school did you go to?
Where did you establish the first central power station?
How many things did you invent?
What is your most important invention?
Are you going to invent something else?
I also asked students to prepare questions to interview General Giap, Uncle Ho and
Andersen.......
Before students came to the board to present their interview, I gave them a poster with
some model sentence to start and end their interview.
Reporter: Hello everyone. Welcome to our program FAMOUS PEOPLE today.
Today, we'll meet a very famous person and welcome Mr. ..................... Thank you for
coming. Take a seat please.
Mr. ........: Thank you. I'm very happy to be here, too.
Reporter: First, I would like to ask you some questions. I hope you don't mind.
Mr. .........: Of course I don't mind. Please go ahead.
Reporter: .......................................................................................................................

(At the end of the interview)
Reporter: Thank you very much Mr. ............... We wish you good health and more
success in your life.
Mr. ........ Thank you.
With this activity, I found all students were enthusiastic to present their interview
though some mistakes in pronunciations were unavoidable. What students acquired
was the way they presented their interview naturally and eagerly.
VII. Table completion.
Aim: + To help students ask and answer questions using adverbs of manner and then
use information to report about their ability using "neither........nor;

both...........and............."
+ Time: About 15 minutes
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
Preparation:
+ Teacher: A sub-board to make model.
+ Students: Revise adverbs of manner.
When I asked students in class 7C to work in pair to ask and answer how their friends
do something by using adverbs of manner they had learnt before. I asked my students
to retell some common adverbs of manner such as carefully, carelessly, well, badly,
skillfully, slowly, quickly, ......
Here are some of the dialogues made by my students.
Nam: How do you cook?
Ha: I cook slowly. And you?
Nam: I cook badly. How do you play soccer?
Ha: I play soccer carefully. And you?
Nam: I play soccer badly.
Obviously, Nam and Ha made some mistakes in using adverbs of manner. From the
mistakes students in class 7C made, when I taught class 7B, I tried a new way and
found it much better.
First, I asked students in class 7 B to do a matching exercise as following:
A

B

cook

skillfully

play soccer,.................

well/ badly

swim

carefully/ carelessly

ride a bike

safely

run

fluently

speak English

fast / quickly

.....................
Then, I asked my students to draw a table like this:

18


Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.

me

my friend (...................)

cook
play soccer
swim
speak English
I told my students to use the following mapped- dialogue to ask their friends and fill
in the table.
A: How can you cook?
B: I cook well. And you?
A: I cook badly.
...........................................................
After students finish their dialogues they will have a table like the following.
me (Minh)

my friend ( Hoang.)

cook

badly

well

play soccer

skillfully

skillfully

swim

slowly

slowly

speak English

fluently

fluently

Once students have their table completed, I asked them to use the following model to
report.
Hoang is my friend. Hoang cooks well but I cook badly. Both Hoang and I play
soccer skillfully. Neither Hoang nor I swim quickly. Both Hoang and I speak English
fluently.
Basing on the model, many of my students asked and answer questions using adverbs
of manner more fluently. Then they could make good report using some advanced
grammar points such as: Both......and........, neither .........nor........
D. CONCLUSION
With some experience and innovation I have used over the years, I find that if
teachers want to help their students develop their speaking skill, they need to prepare
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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.
the lessons carefully and be creative in using speaking activities for students.

Teachers should:
- Provide maximum opportunity to students to speak the target language by providing
a rich environment that contains collaborative work, authentic materials and tasks,
and shared knowledge.
- Try to involve each student in every speaking activity; for this aim, practice
different ways of student participation.
- Reduce teacher speaking time in class while increasing student speaking time. Step
back and observe students.
- Do not correct students' pronunciation mistakes very often while they are speaking.
Correction should not distract student from his or her speech.
- Provide the vocabulary beforehand that students need in speaking activities.
I think that all teachers can use the ways I use for my students as long as they
simplify speaking tasks so that they are suitable for their students' levels.
I am looking forward to receiving sincere comments from all collogues and anyone
who is interested in reading my writing.
Do Luong, 28th, April 2014.

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Some activities to help grade - 7 students at Ly Nhat Quang improve their speaking
skill in extra lessons in the afternoon.

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