5 Quality Speaking Activities for Advanced ESL Students. Class Debate. Class debates are an ideal way to get your advanced students talking, especially because there are several opportunities for speaking practice in one activity. First, break your class into smaller groups of about four or five students.
:::ConversationConversation WorksheetsThe main aim of these Talking Point conversation worksheets is to promote English fluency by presenting students with stimulating discussion questions. All Talking Point conversation worksheets are designed for use with students who have reached Pre-Intermediate level, though they are also very successful with Intermediate and more advanced students. Each Talking Point worksheet is accompanied by Teacher's Notes with answers.Conversation Worksheets.You can use these worksheets in conjunction with the EnglishClub Talking Point and forums, which your students can find via the Talking Point icons on the home page.:::Conversation.
What discussion activities work in class? Tekhnologic, winner of the British Council’s, shares a few ideas in one of our top five articles of all time, illustrated by artist Jamie Johnson.A discussion can bring out your students’ interests and motivate them; it’s a chance for them to talk about the things they really care about.
Giving and justifying opinions in English can also bring students a sense of accomplishment, as they are using the language to express complex ideas.Discussion activities encourage, and are therefore excellent preparation for speaking tests, such as or TOEFL, which partly examine the ability to express and justify opinions in English.Perhaps most importantly, discussion activities can be great fun for students.Preparing for discussion classesThe first thing you need to be aware of is the language ability of your students and how much they know about the topic under discussion. This is important if you want to encourage real, free-flowing conversation. Get it wrong and students can get bored or, worse, feel intimidated and lose confidence.When setting discussion questions, make sure the language and topic aren't too demanding.
Don't try to begin a discussion about global economic theory with elementary-level students.You need to grade the language of the questions to suit the level of your students, and check they understand any complex vocabulary or grammar in advance.Find out what topics interest your students and get them to research the topic before the lesson.Be careful with topics that may lead to embarrassment or offense. It's probably a good idea to steer clear of politics, religion and sex.How much preparation you need to do before class depends on the kind of discussion taking place, and the needs of the students.
An, which lets students direct the lesson content, might suit a more confident group of learners.Some learners prefer a more structured discussion, in which case you may need to work out a plan for who will be talking, for how long, etc. By structuring the discussion and rotating roles, all students get to speak. This can help prevent some students dominating the discussion and others getting left out.Where to find discussion topicsDiscussion activities often begin with questions. A good place to start is, which has a large selection of topics, each with a long list of questions.provides songs that can be used to introduce a discussion topic and to look at it through the song’s lyrics. If you prefer your discussion topics to be current affairs, check out for the latest articles.takes a text and simplifies the language so that it is easier to read or understand. Intermediate students may like this site because it can help them increase their vocabulary and improve their reading comprehension.Alternatively, you can encourage the students to think of their own topics. You could even get them to work in groups to create questions for other groups to discuss.Activities that help students organise their ideasSome activities are based on helping students organise their ideas. Producing in class can act as prompts to keep the discussion going, and help students expand on the topic and order their ideas.are useful ways for learners to order information on a scale.
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For example, you might have 'agree strongly' at one end and 'disagree strongly' at the other. There is an activity called ‘Favourites’ in that uses a cline in this way. You have five choices: A, B, C, D, E.
Each choice represents a sentence or an opinion. The students ask their partner which they agree with the most, which they like least, and order their choices on a cline for comparison. If students need help structuring their ideas, try dividing the teaching board into quarters. Svetlana Kandybovich wrote an about encouraging better speaking by making a graphical representation of the discussion. The central topic was written in a circle in the middle of the board, and then the board was divided into quarters.
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Each quarter could then represent a different point and the reasons behind it.Activities that help students with their languageComparing pictures is a great activity and it can generate a lot of discussion and emergent language (i.e., the language that the students produce as they are talking). The activity is simple. Take two connected images and put them side by side. One example I have used before is the city versus the countryside.Picture activities are ideal for practising the language of comparison but can throw up other language and themes which can be surprising. A conversation comparing the city and the countryside can easily branch off into a discussion about the environment or quality of life.The reason pictures work so well for this activity is that they provide a visual cue for the questions. Is a large collection of images that fall under the Creative Commons copyright licence and is a fantastic source for any teacher.Blocking activities are great for practising modals (should, could, must, etc.) and for giving advice.
I first came across this type of activity in. The idea is for students to write down a statement or several statements on a piece of paper, for example 'I want to hang out with my friends'.
They then mingle and read their statement(s) to a partner. Their partner blocks the statement with a negative and gives a reason why. I usually encourage students to cross their arms to form an X and to shout their negative (You can’t!). That usually results in a few laughs. The students now have enough information for a ‘problem’ that they need to find a solution to.