English in Primary School: Traditional and Innovative Approaches Used in Teaching Listening and Speaking
in Mixed Ability Classes
by Natalia Fotina
INTRODUCTION
Nowadays, teaching speaking and listening issues in the context of rapid
development of all sectors of human activity are obvious. Speaking and listening skills are essential in
all spheres of life. When considering why listening and speaking are important,
the bottom line is: if pupils are good communicators, they will have better
chances of success. They are able to listen to and persuade people, influence
others, negotiate effectively and provide valuable feedback. They can inspire,
motivate and encourage. They can convey their ideas better to everyone, they
can make interesting conversation and they can speak to groups of people with
self-confidence and credibility. The better pupils’ communication skills, the
greater success they can achieve.
Teaching
methodology and linguistics occupy a significant place among scientific
disciplines. Both are closely connected with psychology, sociology and pedagogy
and other sciences.
Our
paper is devoted to speaking and listening skills development, in particular,
in mixed ability primary classes. It outlines some of the considerations
associated with approaches used in teaching speaking and listening, respectively,
the implementation of different methods in teaching practice. This concerns the
description of some of the typical activities used in teaching speaking and
listening, and the formulation of recommendations in this field.
The actuality of our paper lies in the
fact that the importance of speaking and listening skills development in modern
school has long been recognized.
Firstly, an
essential role in the educational process belongs to the ability to listen and communicate
orally, but speaking and listening skills development, in particular, in mixed
ability primary classes has not been investigated enough.
Secondly, listening
and speaking skills development demands special attention of teachers because
our minds are rightly occupied with ‘what’ and how’’. Although our pupils need action, not just words, we strongly
believe that information and right use of main methods and principles of
teaching listening and speaking are the basic tools to raise teachers’
awareness.
Taking the above mentioned into consideration, we aim to elicit certain peculiarities of listening and speaking skills development in primary school.
TEACHING LISTENING AND SPEAKING IN CONTEMPORARY METHODOLOGY
General characteristic of listening and speaking
Speech
origin and speech perception processes have been studied by such scholars as
L.Vygotsky [1], M. Zhynkin[2], О.Leontiev[7], І. Zimnia [3],[4] and
others.
“Speaking is the type of human activity, which lies in communication with other people.
In the process of speaking people’s thoughts are reflected and transmitted orally with the help of this or that language” [10,317]. In the course of a speech act a speaker
produces a text. An interlocutor or a listener understands this text because it
consists of familiar language elements and it is formed according to particular
rules that everybody knows. Thus, speaking is the process of using a language
in the course of which permanent thought exchange is taking place, on the one
hand, it is understanding and digestion of other people thoughts, on the other
hand, it is forming and expressing personal thoughts, feelings and wills.
Speaking as a language
realization is both objective (social) and subjective (individual). Objective
features of speech lie in the fact that its rules are obligatory for all
speakers. Subjectiveness of speaking, in its turn, lies in a way speakers use
these rules. Speaking is linear, as its components, such as phonemes,
syllables, phrases follow each other in speech flow. Besides, speaking is based
on a particular context and situation.
Certain type of speech is
inner speech that is based on phonetic word images and has inner articulation
and cannot be observed or used in the process of communication. Thoughts turn
into inner speech before a speech act is formed. In animals speech and thinking are not
interrelated. According to soviet psychologist L.Vygotsky, a pre-linguistic
period in thought and a pre-intellectual period in speech undoubtedly exist in
the development of the child. Thought and word are not connected by a primary
bond. A connection originates, changes, and grows in the course of the
evolution of thinking and speech.[1]
Speaking
is a productive skill and it provides oral communication in dialogical or
monological form. Listening is a receptive skill. Speaking has a lot of aspects
but in teaching foreign languages the most important are fluency and accuracy.
The latter involves the correct use of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation.
In accuracy activities the focus is on correct language use and the teacher’s
control great. Fluency is the ability to keep going when speak spontaneously.
Speech and listening act
always possesses aim, motive based on need, object or speaker’s thoughts;
product – understanding of what has been said, utterance itself and result in
verbal or non-verbal reaction to it. Y.
Passov claims that certain speaking mechanisms are:
-
reproductive mechanism;
-
selective mechanism that comprises
selection of words and selection of grammar structures;
-
combining mechanism;
-
designing mechanism;
-
forecasting mechanism;
-
discoursing mechanism.
Despite the fact that these
mechanisms are involved in a speech act in any language, the process of
teaching speaking in a foreign language differ from mother tongue acquisition.
Though, while teaching both native and foreign languages, we should take into
account all general didactic and methodological principles.
General
didactic and methodological principles of teaching listening and speaking
Aims
and content of teaching listening and speaking in primary school
Listening and speaking skills development is provided by applying all principles of general didactic. They include scientific
character of teaching, availability, awareness, consistency, intensity,
demonstrativeness, individual approach, theory and practice connection,
interrelation of education and learning [6] etc.
The main methodological
principles, which should also be taken into account in the process of teaching listening
and speaking, include:
-
principle of communicative
orientation of teaching process;
-
principle of differentiated approach
to teaching all language skills;
-
principle of interrelated teaching of
all language skills;
-
principle of activation of hearing
and articulatory movements while forming
speaking skills [4], [5];
-
taking into account the pupils’
mother tongue.
The broad general purpose
behind a primary course of study is planned results which are defined by the
programme. There exist four main aims:
-
practical;
-
educational;
-
upbringing;
-
developmental.
The main goal of teaching listening
and speaking in primary school is to motivate pupils and give them opportunity
to form and then develop their listening and speaking skills and increase their
confidence.
Objectives of teaching listening
and speaking can be defined as specific descriptions of what is to be achieved
in a course, what a learner is expected to be able to do at the end of the
period of instruction that can be a single lesson, a unit of a textbook, a
term’s work etc. For instance, by the end of a school year, first form pupils
of Ukrainian specialized schools are to be able to introduce themselves, their
friends, their family members, name objects, count to ten, recite short rhymes,
sing simple songs, and describe objects and animals according to the situation
and curriculum. The volume of a monological utterance is at least 3-4 sentences
[8]. As for dialogical speech, they are to say hello/goodbye, ask a question,
as in speech models, answer teacher’s or their classmates’ questions, say thank
you or excuse.
Content of teaching listening
and speaking, that is what exactly is to be taught consists of three
components: linguistics, psychological and methodological.
Linguistic component
comprises both language and speech material. Language material includes
carefully selected phonetic, lexical and grammatical material. Speech material
include speech patterns or particular situations and topics, sentence pattern,
dialogue pattern, and structural group, which includes affirmative, negative,
interrogative and exclamatory sentences. Psychological component includes
pronunciation, lexical, grammar sub skills. Methodological component includes
specific study skills which are very important for individual and independent
work with various language resources, such as dictionaries, course books, CD player, computer etc.
Traditional and innovative approaches used in teaching listening and speaking
There exist a wide range of different approaches used in teaching
foreign languages. They are commonly divided into traditional and innovative.
Traditional approaches include:
-
grammar-translation approach;
-
direct method;
-
audio-lingual approach;
-
audio-visual approach;
-
communicative approach
Grammar-translation approach originated from the practice of
teaching Latin in the early 1500s. It is based on translation and
profound learning of grammar rules. Typical grammar-translation classes are usually
conducted in the pupils’ native language. Grammar rules are learned
deductively; pupils learn grammar rules by rote, and then practice the rules by
doing grammar drills and translating sentences to and from the target language.
More attention is paid to the form of the sentences being translated than to
their content. There is not usually any listening or speaking practice, and
very little attention is placed on pronunciation or any communicative aspects
of the language. On the one hand, it gives possibility
to have rather wide stock of passive vocabulary, be very precise in using the
rules, and get acquainted with the history and culture of the target language.
On the other hand, this approach has a big disadvantage – the pupils are not
taught to speak a foreign language fluently and they are not taught to
understand spoken language. The grammar-translation approach is still in use nowadays in hybrid
forms.
Direct
method is a branch of grammar-translation approach the main aim of which is
to teach communication. It was established in
-
Classroom
instructions are always conducted exclusively in the target
language.
-
Only
everyday vocabulary and sentences are taught during the initial phase; grammar,
reading and writing are introduced in intermediate phase.
-
Oral
communication and listening comprehension skills are built up in a carefully
graded progression organized around question-and-answer exchanges between the
teacher and pupils in small, intensive classes.
-
Grammar
is taught inductively.
-
New
teaching points are introduced orally.
-
Concrete
vocabulary is taught through demonstration, objects, and pictures; abstract
vocabulary is taught by association of ideas.
-
Both
speech and listening comprehensions are taught.
-
Pupils
should be taught pronunciation rules through active listening to the teacher or
recorded speech. Correct pronunciation and grammar are emphasized.
-
A
learner should be speaking approximately 80% of the time during the lesson.
-
Pupils
are taught from inception to ask questions in the target language as well as
answer them.
Audio-lingual
approach is based on behaviorist psychology and structural
linguistics. Like the direct method, the
audio-lingual approach advised that pupils should be taught a language
directly, without using the pupils' mother tongue to explain new words or
grammar in the target language. However, unlike the direct method, the
audio-lingual method does not focus on teaching vocabulary. Teachers drill
pupils in the use of grammar. They present a correct model of a sentence and
the pupils have to repeat it. The teacher then continues by presenting new
words for the pupils to sample in the same structure. In audio-linguism, there
is no explicit grammar instruction—everything is simply memorized in form. The
idea is for the pupils to practice the particular construction until they can
use it spontaneously. In this manner, the lessons are built on static drills in
which the pupils have little or no control on their own output. As we can see,
this approach assumes using a great number of dialogues and drilling/
mechanical exercises. These include repetition, where pupils repeat an
utterance as soon as they hear it, inflection, where one word in a sentence
appears in another form when repeated, replacement, where one word is replaced
by another, and restatement, when pupils paraphrase an utterance.
Audio
visual approach assumes using a number of visuals in presentation of new
material. To some extent, the audio-visual approach was based upon the same
kind of thinking as the audio-lingual approach. However, two important changes
were made. Firstly, the matter to be taught was based not only on a structural
analysis of language, but also on the statistical analysis of a corpus of
ordinary, everyday language. The analysis made it possible to construct the
programme on the basis of the frequency of particular structures and lexical
items. Secondly, the lessons were structured around an opening dialogue, which
was accompanied with a film that contextualized it. Language was to be
understood within a sensual context, rather than abstracted from visual
reality.
Communicative approach was developed by British linguists. It emphasises that the goal of
language learning is communicative competence. A foreign language is taught in
order to supply the learners’ needs and help them express and understand
different functions of the language in different types of situations. Nowadays
this approach is considered to be the main approach in studying foreign
languages and it is widely used all over the world.
Innovative
approaches include two large groups of approaches: comprehension-based and
productive-based.
Comprehension-based
approaches emphasize understanding of language rather than speaking. There
exists total physical response approach,
which presupposes that the teacher gives commands, first for a single action,
then for a series of actions, and pupils should respond to the teacher’s
command. They should show that they understand the teacher. This method is
based on natural acquisition of communicative skills and it can be successfully
used only with very young learners. Natural
approach emphasizes that learners comprehend the material through different
pictures and actions during the pre-productive stage. Then, in three-four weeks
the speech emerges naturally in different situations. The learners are not
forced to repeat and learn by heart. This approach emphasizes fluency not at
the core of accuracy.
Production-based approaches include:
-
silent
way learning;
-
humanistic
and psychosuggestive approaches;
Silent way learning presuppose
that teachers do not speak much, their verbal input is restricted to minimum.
It can be an example of a word, or a phrase, or put forward a problem, and
verbal output is elicited from learners. The teacher corrects and guides the
learners by means of gestures and silent lip moving and creates cooperative and
supportive atmosphere in the class. This approach can be apply either to
beginners for introducing sounds or separate words and practicing
pronunciation, and to advanced learners for problem solving.
Humanistic and psychosuggestive
approaches include suggestopeadia
and community language learning. The
latter stresses the importance of treating the learners as individual human
beings and requires the teacher to be a sympathetic counselor, a guide, a
friend, rather than an authority or an instructor. The approach emphasizes
students’ personal feelings and their reaction to language learning. Learners
usually say things they want to talk about in their native language, and their
teacher helps them to translate it into the target language. Then learners
repeat these utterances and use them in their talk with other members of the
group. But this method cannot be used with the beginners. One more approach of
this group is suggestopeadia. It
makes use of dialogues, situations, music, visuals, images and relaxation
exercises in order to make learning more comfortable and effective, making
maximum use of brains’ capacity to combine conscious and unconscious for
learning. All this promote learning supper-conductivity – a perfect state of
learning receptiveness which enables learners to process massive input into
intake with no-forgetting. This approach was suggested by G. Lazanov for
developing accelerated learning method.
Deductive and inductive approaches
to teaching dialogue in primary school As it was mentioned above, speaking is
realized in two forms – dialogue and monologue. In real life dialogue prevails,
so it also dominates in the process of teaching speaking at school. There are
two main approaches to teaching speaking: deductive and inductive. Both of them
are based on a pattern dialogue and have three stages in the process of
teaching.
The first stage presupposes
introduction that is the same for both approaches. At this stage the pattern
dialogue is introduced orally. Pupils may read it doing some changes in
language patterns. Deductive approach at the second stage presupposes learning
the dialogue by heart and acting it out in front of the class. Inductive
approach presupposes learning some expressions, word combinations, idioms, etc.
It is devoted to creation pupils’ personal dialogue. Thus, deductive approach
is more appropriate for elementary pupils, because they do not have enough
language skills to make out their own dialogues.
The role of situation in organization of listening and speaking activities in primary school
A situation is a set of
conditions, verbal and non-verbal, which is necessary and enough to perform a
speech activity. Situations can be standard, variable, real, teaching, speech,
non-speech, descriptive and problematic. They can be provided by the teacher
with the help of visual, verbal, or both, support. For elementary level pupils
the teacher creates the situation and supplies some visual or verbal support in
the form of patterns, charts, speech patterns, key words, word combinations,
pictures, flash cards, etc. The main aim of a situation is to create conditions
for listening or aural communication. Situations can be for pure teaching
purposes, but more creative situations are those that are closer to real life,
where learners can use their personal experience and background language.
There is perhaps one main
conclusion to be drawn from the first part of our paper: in contemporary
language teaching the main didactic and methodological principles of teaching listening
and speaking do not change, the content and objectives of teaching listening
and speaking are defined by the curriculum. In the course of the critical
analysis of original sources we can also conclude that nowadays practically all
known approaches to teaching listening and speaking or their elements are used,
in this or that form. Most foreign language teachers prefer to combine them in
order to reach the goal, which is to teach pupils to communicate with other
people orally.
TEACHING
MIXED ABILITY CLASSES
Definition
of a mixed ability class
Grouping pupils according to their ability would seem a logical way to
allow all pupils to achieve their potential. However it makes very transparent
the differences in the academic ability of pupils and is therefore not a very
inclusive approach. Setting can lead to stigmatisation, low self-esteem and
disruptive behaviour in pupils in lower sets. A mixed ability class allows for
more of a social mix but relies heavily on the expertise of the teacher in
helping a wide range of pupils achieve their potential. There is the danger
that the more able might not be stretched enough while the less able are
neglected.
What is a mixed ability class? Nowadays a
number of teachers see a mixed ability class as consisting of a group of
average and able children with a subset of children who have learning problems.
In the present paper we suggest teachers need to recognise that a class is
mixed ability because children have different strengths and weaknesses and
develop at different rates. They have different preferences for learning and
displaying their work. A mixed ability class does not just consist of a range
of abilities but also a range of learning styles and preferences. All pupils
will show strengths at different times depending on the topic being studied and
the learning style being used. According to British methodologists Andrew
Littlejohn and Diana Hicks, all classes
consist of individual pupils with different personalities and interests. All
pupils also, themselves, have 'mixed abilities'. [14] For example, some pupils may find reading easier than speaking or
vice versa. Some pupils find one particular activity or approach more appealing
than other activities or approaches. It is also important to distinguish two
aspects of 'ability': language ability and language learning ability. The first
aspect refers to how much language the pupils actually know/understand at a
particular point in time. The second aspect refers to their ability to learn. A
pupil may be weak in English, for example, but given appropriate support may be
able to learn quickly. This suggests that some 'mixed ability' classes may be
the result of particular approaches to teaching (the ability to learn or the
ability to be taught?). From this point of view, all classes, even those that
have been set according to different levels of language competence, are mixed
ability to a certain degree. For this reason, teachers need to adopt a flexible
methodology that allows for a variety of learning styles and abilities. There
is no commonly accepted definition of learning styles; however, a core concept
is that individuals differ in how they learn. One of the most common and
widely-used categorizations of the various types of learning styles presupposes
that the learners can be roughly divided into visual learners; auditory
learners and kinaesthetic learners. However, there exist some other models.
Practical ideas
and strategies for teaching mixed ability classes
One key principle in teaching mixed
ability groups is transparency.
The teacher should make sure that all
pupils understand what is happening in the lesson, for example by over viewing
before beginning the lesson or a new listening or speaking task. There are some
of ways in which we can approach teaching classes of mixed language and
learning ability:
-
stronger/average/weaker
pupils can be given completely different tasks at different levels of
difficulty;
-
pupils
can be given tasks on the same topic at varying levels of difficulty;
-
pupils
can be involved in open-ended tasks which allow them to respond at their own
level of ability.
In principle, the first and the third approaches are better, since they
avoid pupils feeling left out. Third approach, additionally, allows a pupil to
develop more freely without being restricted by the tasks themselves. One of
the ways of teaching is to provide tasks at varying levels of difficulty on the
same topic, think about how a task can be made more challenging or how more support
can be given.
Speaking activities in
primary language class may have different forms: individual, whole class, group
and pair interaction. Whole class activities, when the teacher is in the
centre, are appropriate for controlled practice or for introducing new
material. Individual work is appropriate for whole preparation and performing a
monologue in front of the class. The most effective types of interaction in
primary school are whole class activities and pair work, where pupils have
opportunities to speak all the time without being interrupted by the teacher.
These activities appropriate for listening and acting out dialogues, games,
simulations, etc.
In pair work,
the teacher should try to mix pupils so that pupils of all abilities can work
together. Similar-abilities pairs may do speaking tasks where each role is
interchangeable and the same difficulty. Mixed-ability pairs need unequal
tasks, such as role play with one larger role etc. Hence, the following recommendations for teachers, who
work with mixed ability classes, are suggested below.
- Make pupils
aware about the different learning styles.
-
Teach
pupils techniques for learning new work that
cover the visual, auditory and kinaesthetic
modes of learning.
-
Make
sure that pupils are aware of what they are
expected to achieve by the end of the listening or speaking activity.
-
Try
to involve pupils in the learning process. Perhaps allow pupils to choose the order topics are studied in.
-
Vary
presentation techniques to cater for visual, auditory and kinaesthetic learners. Vary classroom management.
-
Allow
pupils to work individually, in pairs and in
groups. At times provide a menu of work on
the board.
-
Allow
pupils to choose their level of work.
-
Allow
pupils to show their understanding in different ways i.e. a visual representation, an oral presentation or physical
demonstration.
-
Make
use of flexible pairs at suitable exit points in the course to allow for reinforcement and extension.
-
Make
use of class ability groups and set pupils creative tasks to do. Use co-operative group work to allow pupils to develop
social skills as well as other skills such as
negotiation and time management.
Teaching a mixed ability class in primary school will
work if all pupils are allowed to experience
success and to learn as individuals. It is less likely to be successful if teachers insist on whole class teaching
and teaching to the average child. It is unrealistic to
expect any group of pupils whatever the ability to work through a body of work at exactly the same pace. Two thirds of pupils will be working out of their learning
style unless the type of
task is varied.
Children cannot overcome blocks to learning if they have not learnt how to
learn. Teachers should act as role models for learning and teach pupils how to
become independent and effective learners. Pupils need to be taught learning
techniques and how to be resourceful. Pupils will be more motivated if they
understand the aim of a lesson and have some input. The teacher should reflect
on classroom practice. Teachers need to accept their new role first of all as a
learner themselves and a facilitator of learning. The emphasis is not on what
teachers teach but on what pupils learn.
Types of speaking activities in mixed ability classes
How to start teaching
speaking a mixed ability class from the very beginning? To answer this
difficult question let us have a look on how a child’s speaking skills develop.
Undoubtedly, in real life, speaking is prepared by listening, and then thinking
skills and pronunciation sub skills’ development takes place: a child learns to
pronounce single meaningless sounds, then syllables and then single words,
phrases, sentences, etc in a particular situation, when there is a
reason/motive for oral communication. Thus, teaching speaking goes side by side
with teaching listening and pronunciation.
When on the first week of
September a foreign language teacher comes for the first time to a mixed
ability class that consists of beginners aged 6 or 7, he or she should do at
least five things: say hello, introduce his or her name, teach pupils to say
hello in response to this greeting, get to know pupils’ names, introduce the
language and a course book they are going to study. Teaching pronunciation,
vocabulary, forming listening comprehension and forming speaking skills starts
from this point. In order to say Hello!
or ask and answer the question What’s
your name?, pupils need to understand the meaning of the exchanges, they
need to know how the sounds [h], [əυ] and [w] are articulated, and they should
be shown the difference between the new sounds and sounds of the mother tongue.
And here the teacher should know and use appropriately particular techniques
and approaches for this very first lesson and make multi-level pupils
interested in these activities.
Turn taking is an important skill for young
children to develop. A turn is the time when a speaker is talking and
turn-taking is the skill of knowing when to start and finish a turn in a
conversation. It is an important organisational tool in spoken discourse. The
examples below show short conversational exchanges between a teacher and pupils
with different levels of language competence:
1. Teacher: What’s your name?
Pupil with lower level of
language competence:…….
Teacher: Are you
Tom/Dan/Boris?
Pupil with lower level of
language competence: Dan.
2. Teacher: What’s your name?
Average pupil: I’m Nikita/ My
name’s Nikita.
3. Teacher: Tell me about yourself, please, your name, age, interests.
Pupil with higher level of
language competence: My name’s Lily. I’m seven.
I’m a pupil. I like swimming.
Actually, all speaking
activities can be divided into three main groups:
-
controlled activities,
-
guided activities;
-
creative activities
Controlled activities assume that the
material is fully provided by the teacher. The aim of controlled activities is
to form or improve accurate use of vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and also
to fast confidence in learners. Activities of this type may include imitation
of words, structures, sentences, patterns, answering questions, etc. The following examples of controlled speaking
activities demonstrate implementation of audio-lingual approach in the context
of teaching mixed ability classes and show how more than one type of drill can
be used into one practice session:
1.
For pupils
with higher level of language competence
Teacher: There are three pens on the desk ... repeat
Pupils: There are three pens on the desk.
Teacher: Pencils.
Pupils: There are three pencils on the desk.
Teacher: Two copybooks.
Pupils: There are two copybooks on the desk.
Teacher: On the floor.
Pupils: There are two copybooks on the floor.
etc.
2.
For pupils
with lower level of language competence
Teacher: Three pens ... repeat
Pupils: Three pens.
Teacher: Pencils.
Pupils: Three pencils.
Teacher: Copybooks.
Pupils: Three copybooks.
Teacher: On the floor.
Pupils: Three copybooks on the floor.
In guided activities the
material is partially provided by the teacher and the task for the pupils is to
complete the sentences, or dialogues, using the material they have learnt.
Creative or
free-communicative activities are designed to give pupils either creative
practice opportunities for predicting, language or general fluency practice
where specific language is less relevant. For creative activities there always
should be reason, so there should be a gap between the speakers. The examples
of such activities are filling in information gap, role playing, games,
simulations and others.
Some children have difficulty expressing themselves verbally in a way
that is clear, relaxed, and fluent. One reason for this difficulty may be that
they do not have enough opportunities to practice their speaking skills. If
children are to express themselves well, they may need a substantial amount of
systematic instruction and practice. In speaking as in other language skills,
facility is normally the result of considerable practice.
The practice may well begin in the early years of school when young
children are imaginative and eager to perform. At this age, language
experiences can be fun and meaningful for the child. Carefully structured experiences
should increase children’s fluency and skill and give them an early start in
communication.
Role playing gives the pupils practice in for
types of dramatic and speaking skills: pantomime, improvisation, speaking, and
play production. Pupils can begin by pantomiming simple movements. Then they can
progress to pantomiming stories, to giving prepared speeches, to dramatize
dialogues, and finally to act out simple plays.
Thus, on
the basis of foregoing, the following conclusions can be made: teaching mixed ability classes has
a lot in common with individual approach to teaching, basic principles of which
are respecting pupils, understanding their special needs, knowing their
personalities and learning styles, creating positive and supportive learning
environment. The key to success is not
how pupils are grouped but the attitude and skills of the teacher in the
classroom.
CONCLUSION
The
results of our research enable us to draw some general conclusions.
First of
all, in the course of retrospective analysis of some existing scientific works
on methodology and traditional and innovative approaches to teaching listening
and speaking we have come to the conclusion that in contemporary language
teaching the main didactic and methodological principles of teaching listening
and speaking and approaches do not change. Most foreign language teachers
prefer to combine them in order to conduct an effective lesson and teach pupils
to listen to each other and communicate orally.
We have
also found out that listening and speaking skills development in mixed ability
classes is a challenging task. It is not investigated enough and complicated
due to the large amount of approaches used in teaching foreign
languages and existence of different ability groups and learning styles;
consequently, teaching listening and speaking issues remain unavoidable and
occupy and important position in teaching mixed ability classes.
Secondly, selecting an
appropriate approach to teaching listening and speaking from various options is
complicated by the fact that no approach can be fully
appropriate, due to a number of differences between learners’ abilities.
Thirdly, we have found out that teachers have to imply flexible methodology and individual approach in managing listening and speaking activities in mixed ability classrooms. Thus, listening and speaking skills development in mixed ability groups demands special attention of a teacher; consequently, it requires further research.
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Лурия]. М.: Изд-во Акад.
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