Recent studies show that training in oral communication skills is one of the primary needs of industry. Among those skills are listening, persuading, and instructing. One reason that oral communication skills are becoming increasingly important is that business, industrial, and government organizations are larger and more complicated than they…

The 53 teaching strategies accompanying the 10 performance objectives in this guide for grades kindergarten through 12 focus on specific kinds of oral language. Each of the objectives is designed so that after the completion of the program students will be able to (1) use appropriate levels of language for given situations; (2) present both…

The activities included in this book are based on current theory on effective oral communication and are intended to increase students' repertoire and use of effective oral communication behaviors. Specifically, the book's activities are designed to (1) appeal to students of all ability levels; (2) provide for student interaction and involvement;…

Describes classroom language as used in teaching an FL, recognizing it as belonging to an artificial rather than a real-life situation; this fact must be kept in mind and "the game played" in the classroom. Examples are given. (IFS/WGA)

Providing for individual differences in ability, interest, and cultural values among students, this guide contains resources, goals, objectives, sample lesson plans, and activities for teaching speech and drama to elementary school students. The first section of the guide offers advice on the organization of a speech arts curriculum, approaches to…

The Bureau of Research and Assessment developed a two-staged approach for assessing speaking skills. All students were to be initially rated by two of their current classroom teachers- (teacher observations). A limited number of students would be assessed by a rater in a focused measure of student performance (one-on-one ratings). The purpose of…

To analyze the process involved in maintaining conversational coherency, the study described in this paper used a construct called a "context space" that grouped utterances referring to a single issue or episode. The paper defines the types of context spaces, parses individual conversations to identify the underlying model or structure,…

A SUMMER WORKSHOP CONCERNED WITH THE EDUCATION OF THE SPANISH- AND INDIAN-SPEAKING STUDENTS OF NEW MEXICO AND ARIZONA MET IN TUCSON, ARIZONA, TO ESTABLISH OBJECTIVES REGARDING THESE CHILDREN AND THEIR SPEAKING PROBLEMS. THE STUDENTS WERE DROPPING OUT OF SCHOOL AS A RESULT OF ACADEMIC AND SOCIAL FAILURE AND FRUSTRATION. BICULTURAL GUIDANCE, AN…

The research reported in this book was based on the belief that Australian schools should develop the speech communication as well as the reading and writing skills of their students. The book is designed to provide educators and researchers with guidelines for future work on oral language assessment and on curriculum development. The first…

This paper provides an overview of relevant oral communication theory, research, and practice from a variety of sources, such as the fields of linguistics, psychology, speech communication, and education. It describes the nature of oral communication skills, including the similarities and differences between oral and written communication. It…

A study was undertaken to clarify the inconsistent research findings on the effects of the sex of the evaluator and the sex of the speaker in classroom speech criticism by examining the effects of the sex role identification and the sexism of the evalutor. One hundred twenty-three college students enrolled in a basic public speaking course…

In this study, Hull's Drive Theory was applied to a test of the effects of general anxiety and situational stress upon speakers' lexical diversity, speaking rate, speaking time, and evaluations made of the speakers' ability. Recordings of speeches made by 122 individuals were rated by three judges on scales measuring central idea and analysis,…

Role play with toys was modeled to develop communicative language function in 14 visually impaired Ss (ages 8-26 years) who also were mentally retarded. Before treatment, Ss' language was non-communicating and characterized by echolalic and stereotypic verbal responses. Few questions and little narrative speech was present even in those Ss who had…

One provision of the Ryan Act, a legislative move intended to improve teacher training programs in California, was the requirement that all teacher candidates be examined for competence in both speaking and oral reading. To ascertain how shools of higher education across that state were dealing with this provision, a questionnaire was sent to 38…

A TECHNIQUE FOR ORAL TESTING IN THE LANGUAGE LABORATORY IS OUTLINED. TO PROPERLY TEST STUDENTS' ORAL ABILITY, THE TEST SHOULD BE PREPARED LIKE THE LESSONS--CUE OR QUESTION, STUDENT RESPONSE, CORRECT RESPONSE. SO AS NOT TO REQUIRE EXCESSIVE GRADING TIME ON THE TEACHER'S PART, THE LABORATORY SHOULD HAVE FACILITIES TO START AND STOP STUDENT TAPE…