Speak a Lot

Introduction

Speak a Lot is a great new way to learn spoken English, and quite a departure from the standard ELT course book. Instead of spending hours reading and writing, students have the opportunity to engage in challenging and fun speaking and listening activities with their friends.On this course students learn how to think in English as well as Talk a Lot!

The Speak Lot course objectives are very simple:

• Every student talking in English
• Every student listening to and understanding English
• Every student thinking in English, and
• Every student taking part in class

Speak a Lot is structured so that every student can practise and improve English grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, intonation, word and sentence stress, and interpersonal skills, by working in pairs, groups and one to one with the teacher.

This course is aimed at students who are at a good elementary level or preintermediate level. For this course we recommend that there are no more than ten students per class.

1. The course is divided into twelve three-hour lessons. The first ten lessons each have a different topic; while lesson 11 is intended for the revision of material studied over the ten weeks, and lesson 12 is reserved for the students’ examinations and an end of course review. We recommend that you hold one lesson per week, making this a twelve week course comprising 30 guided learning hours, plus 6 hours of guided revision and examination. It’s up to you what order you do the lessons in; you don’t have to follow our order of topics!
2. If your students need more than three hours of study per week, why not offer them two 3-hour lessons per week: one Talk a Lot lesson, as described below, and one lesson using traditional teaching methods, which include conventional reading, writing and grammar-based activities that could complement the intensive speaking and listening work of the

In Week 2, both 3-hour lessons are on the subject of Food and Drink. This would then give you a course with 60 guided learning hours.

Lesson Outline

• In our lesson outline, each lesson lasts for three hours (180 teaching minutes). This can vary according to your needs, for example, in some English language classrooms one teaching hour is equal to 45 minutes, and so 3 teaching hours would be 2¼ hours. Or it may be that you have only 2 hours per week with your group of students. You can still use Talk a Lot activities to serve up a satisfying and stimulating lesson – just in a shorter timeframe.

Assessment Methods, Tests and Examination

• Written homework based on the topics and activities from each lesson could be given,
• Vocabulary Tests, Lesson Tests, Verb Forms Practice,

Sentence Blocks

• Designed specifically for the Talk a Lot course, the sentence block method is a brand new way to teach English grammar with speaking practice. The main benefit of this method is that the students have to do all of the work. They must listen, think hard, and remember.

 Discussion Questions

• Students work in pairs with student A asking student B the first question, then student B asking student A the same question, before moving on to the next question. After between 5- 10 minutes the students change partners and repeat the process with a different student.

 Role Plays

• Students work in pairs or groups of three to develop and rehearse a short role play with three scenes, based on the information given to them on the handout, which is then performed to the rest of the class. They have to include the title of the outline somewhere in their role play, e.g. Family role play

 Discussion Words and Question Sheets

• It’s amazing how much you can do with forty cut-out vocabulary words! We have outlined many activities for using these words with students on the discussion words question sheets.