Six steps to oral fluency - British Council Teachers Conference 2015: "Learning to Learn"

Six Steps to Oral Fluency1. Work on language - including students

recording themselves using ipadio app on smartphones

2. Students do communicative speaking tasks3. Class feedback using WhatsApp web on IWB4. Students repeat the task recording themselves

using ipadio app on smartphones5. Individual feedback and evaluation of

recordings on ipadio web and Edmodo6. Students add best recordings to e-portfolios of

spoken and written work on WordPress

Six Steps to Oral Fluency1. Work on language - including students

recording themselves using ipadio app on smartphones

2. Students do communicative speaking tasks3. Class feedback using WhatsApp web on IWB4. Students repeat the task recording themselves

using ipadio app on smartphones5. Individual feedback and evaluation of

recordings on ipadio web and Edmodo6. Students add best recordings to e-portfolios of

spoken and written work on WordPress

1. Working on language

• Practising pronunciation

• Doing grammar and vocabulary exercises

• Reading aloud

Practising pronunciation

The ipadio page http://ipad.io/pCRV Elisabet:

http://ipad.io/pCRV

Doing grammar and vocabulary exercises

The ipadio page http://ipad.io/qCL7 Jose doing the exercise

Reading aloud

The ipadio page http://ipad.io/bDmR Dolors

2. Communicative speaking tasks

• Retelling stories• Being interviewed

Retelling stories

Retelling stories

What the students listened to Carla’s re-telling

The ipadio page http://ipad.io/gCfk

http://ipad.io/gCfk

Retelling stories

What the students listened to Carla’s re-telling

My feedback:Hannah stopped just in timeshe got out of the carshe looked at the manJamie got in the carthey ordered a cup of coffee

across /r/carsorry /r/nearlybar

8 minutes including recording these examples read twice

Being interviewed

• Not as frequently used as re-telling

Lidia G being interviewed

The ipadio page http://ipad.io/bDoc

3. Whole class feedback

Whole class feedback

• https://web.whatsapp.com/





4. Students repeat the task

• And record themselves

• Mobile phones, or tablets (BYOD)

• ipadio apps for Android and iPhones

• Wi-Fi

How do students record themselves?


• No SIM required, so old phones can be

recycled

• No data charges if only WIFI

• Even simple phones CAN be used, but …


My review of ipadio on Google Play

1. Generous length for each recording

2. Easy to post (all or) selected recordings to an eportfolio on

WordPress or Blogger

3. Easy to embed manually in Edmodo, for example

4. Teachers can follow students, although this needs improving

5. Teachers (and students) can add comments, although it would be

nice if ‘new lines could be used’


What can the teacher do with these recordings?

• Listen to some of them ( 1, or 2 a week?)– I usually select short ones like pronunciation

and reading aloud or grammar exercises• Write comments on these using ipadio on

a web page – using a phone or a tablet or a computer

• Evaluate 1 recording a week selected by each student (on a computer)

Write comments on selected ipadio recordings



Evaluate 1 recording a week selected by each student



https://britishcouncilamigo.edmodo.com/home#/assignment?mid=339691031&uid=57091315


• 1024• Listen once to the first minute of your recording and pause when you get to

each of these grammar mistakes and take some notes:

• Hannah stopped just in time• she got out of the car• she looked at the man• Jamie got in the car• they ordered a cup of coffee

• Here are some pronunciation problems. Listen to my recording and repeat the grammar mistakes and the pronunciation mistakes. There should be time to repeat them. Use your mobile to record my version and yours and then listen and compare them:

• across /r/ car sorry /r/• Nearly bar

Carla Me


• Your pronunciation was good but in all these problems you made a mistake with the letter 'r' Listen to me, and then look at the BBC pronunciation pages about /r/. ‘Bar’ and ‘car’ are not said with an /r/ they are /ba:/ and /ka:/ just a long /a/ and ‘nearly’ doesn't have an /r/, either

• Listen again to the first minute of your recording and stop at each of these grammar and pronunciation errors above and say each word correctly.

• Very fluent, but a few grammar problems and one or two pronunciation problems to solve.

• I've just spent 8 minutes on this. Please make sure that you spend at least as much time as me trying to learn from your mistakes. If you like you can make a new recording and post it here.

• Here's the link to /r/ from BBC Learning English:http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/english/features/pronunciation/otherconst6

What can students do with their recordings?

• Listen to their own recordings– Not all students do this, which is a pity

• Re-do at home any recordings they are not happy with– Even fewer students do this…

• Read my comments on selected recordings• Select their best recordings for me to evaluate• Read my comments on their best recordings• Add their best recordings to their e-portfolios

Students add their best recordings to their e-portfolios

•https://my.ipadio.com/Settings.aspx#share •https://my.ipadio.com/Settings.aspx#share

Students can add all their recordings to their e-portfolios


https://my.ipadio.com/Settings.aspx?#broadcasts


https://tuleka.wordpress.com/2014/06/10/begin-rob-and-jennifer/

Student opinions about recording themselves

» Pre-intermediate:• 4 people out of 7 mentioned that recording

themselves had been useful.• 3 people out of 6 said they would like to record

themselves next year• 4 out of 6 said they would like to have a class library or

use the library next year» Intermediate:

• 3 out of 4 students mentioned recording themselves as important

• 3 out of 4 mentioned listening to their recordings• All 4 students said that a class library or active use of the

library by teachers/students was very important

Students recording themselves

• Pre-intermediate• This year:• 1635 recordings!• 3.2 per student per day

• Last year:• 828 recordings• 1.6 per student per day

• Intermediate• This year• 1121 recordings!• 2.9 per student per day

• Last year:• 620 recordings• 1.5 per student per day

Analysis of my experiment with evaluating recordings 2013-2014

• I evaluated 169 recordings made by my students and, in theory, selected by them as their best work of the fortnight and spent on average 9.7 minutes on each one.

• Based on the statistics I gathered, a limit of 5 minutes' feedback should generate on average 6 Grammar, and 3 Pronunciation problems, which is a total of 9 problems, which is surely enough!

• I calculate that listening to just the first minute three times will probably take five minutes, particularly if I record the pronunciation myself instead of providing links to www.howjsay.com .

Taken from my 'End Of Year Comments' in my End of Year Review, 2013 - 2014


• I tested listening to just the first minute with 6 recordings and in fact, it took close to 5 minutes and I was able to give an average of 4/5 grammar points and 5/6 pronunciation points and record my pronunciation of the pronunciation points and upload the recording to Edmodo.

• As the average time I spent on feedback this year (2013-2014) was 9.7 minutes every two weeks, limiting feedback to 5 minutes next year but doing it every week will make the total amount of time I spend on feedback roughly the same, but will make it more digestible as 9 things to work on at a time will be more practical than 18 things at a time!




Download this PowerPoint

• You can find a link to this presentation on my blog.

• http://onewaytotefl.blogspot.com.es/ • or by reading this

QR codeI use the i-nigma app

• Contact me here:• [email protected]

Students Recording Themselves

• A similar session was recorded and archived here

• http://onewaytotefl.blogspot.com.es/2015/07/students-recording-themselves-in-class.html

Education

Six steps to oral fluency - British Council Teachers Conference 2015: "Learning to Learn"