Oral Communication

"The biggest communication problem we have is we do not listen to understand, we listen to reply."

We speak hundreds or even thousands of words a day, yet the skill set of effective speaking has become quite challenging to find in people.  The vast majority of people will tell you the hate and even fear public speaking, but why is this?  Students are not encouraged enough and not given adequate opportunities within the classroom to speak and listen, though effective speaking is vital to student learning and development.  Students need to feel as though their words matter and their opinions matter.  Barack Obama addressed this idea in an inspiring 2008 speech where he states "Don't tell me words don't matter."

This speech holds essential ideals for students to hear and realize to boost confidence and boost speaking to hold the same educational value as reading and writing.  The biggest challenge teachers may face is motivating the introverts of the classroom to participate in classroom discussions.  With speaking and listening becoming a hot topic, many strategies have also surfaced.

Accountable Talk

In order for effective speak in the classroom to take place, teachers first need to address appropriate and inappropriate responses, especially when dealing with opinions.  Students can become very easily discouraged if they feel their opinion has been belittled.  Accountable talk strategies are an essential component to teach students not only how to effectively respond, but further how to effectively listen.  Anchor charts are a great tool to keep as a reminder for students on how to participate in discussion.

Students are encouraged to respond in respectful ways to reinforce a positive environment.  Students will ask questions such as.

"To challenge your point.."
"To clarify, what do you mean by ... "

Accountable talk addresses issues of equality, where all voices and opinions matter and are addressed in respectful ways.

Debates

Once accountable talk has been established in the classroom, effective talk becomes much easier to attain.  Debates are a great way to get students excited about public speaking.  When a student is put on the spot and asked a question in class, they might have a harder time articulating their thoughts because they have not had adequate time to think about their answer or look into it.  With debates, students get excited about their topic and their confidence in speaking increases as they have become experts in their topic in a sense.  Education world has a great article, titled Debates in the Classroom for teachers looking to add debates into their classroom.  The article outlines various lessons for incorporating debates and outlines the benefits of using debates in the classroom.  

Another great article that discusses the importance of debates is Debate: Where Speaking and Listening Come First.  The article highlights how forms of debates can be seen, but often lack substance and ultimately end up being just simple conversations.  However, debates offer much more than an argumentative debate and further, debates encompass various literacy skills such as listening, writing, and communication skills.  The article describes the benefits of utilizing debates in instruction and elaborates on how to effectively implement them in the classroom.

Math Talks

Reading and writing skills are practiced in every other subject, the skills are interchangeable, yet speaking again is often neglected.  Bringing talking strategies into all subjects is another tactic teachers should try to initiate.  

Math is maybe the most difficult to add speaking and listening strategies into the lesson.  However, one way to accomplish this is through daily math talks.  Get students to talk through their strategies they would use to solve the problem.  Its amazing to hear how unique some students are in how they interpret and digest equations.  Through math talks, students are encouraged to articulate their learning and thought process.  Other students can begin to see how their peers might solve problems differently.  This helps to boost student confidence as they begin to see there are multiple different ways to do something, and one way is not necessarily better than another. 

Edutopia also has numerous resources to help teachers effectively implement talking and listening strategies in the classroom.  Oracy in the Classroom: Strategies for Effective Talk,is an article posted by Edutopia that outlines how to achieve this and shows the effectiveness of such talk strategies within a real classroom.  The article is accompanied by a short video that highlights different techniques to use with students to promote equity and confidence for students to understand their voice matters.