This document discusses teaching and assessing oral language skills. It provides examples of oral language activities that could be used in English classes, such as having students discuss poems in small groups or conduct interviews. It also addresses barriers to developing exploration-oriented classroom discussions and how to overcome them. Assessment of oral language is discussed, including possible criteria like articulateness, effectiveness, and collaboration. The importance of developing students' oral communication skills is emphasized.

1. Teaching and Assessing
Oral Language
PED 4177 Module 2

2. Overview
• Oral Language requirement in the Ontario
Senior High Curriculum
• Oral language activities for ELA classes
• Assessing Oral language skills.

3. Warm-up Activity
• Take a strip of paper from the pile at the front of
the room. For the next five minutes, share your
line with as many colleagues as possible as you
attempt to figure out what this poem is about.
• Five minute focused-freewrite on what you think
the poem “intends” based on your experience
with it so far.

4. Madeline Grummet
• “Currere, is a process of critical reflection of
one’s own educational experience. It is pursued
in the conviction that as I reconstruct the
relation of the knower to the known from my
own educational experience, I can reclaim those
possibilities of my own experience and action in
the world that have been deleted from the
curriculum that I have become.”

5. Reflection
1. In what context did most student talk occur in your
own high school English classrooms: lesson-centered,
whole-class, or small group discussions; group
projects; literature circles; conferencing; or personal
conversations?
2. What was the usual direction? Teacher to student?
Student to teacher? Student to student?
3. What was the proportion of student talk to silence? Of
student talk to teacher talk?
4. Would you characterize the classes you’ve participated
in as monologic or dialogic? What teacher moves
created dialogic patterns of interaction?

6. Silence in the Classroom
“One of the most disheartening observations in high
schools we visit is the silence in many classrooms.
Although these appear to be controlled and orderly to
some, to us they appear impoverished. Inside the
classrooms, what talk we hear is often highly structured:
Teachers give directions, students raise informational
questions, and teachers answer.
Often, even teacher-led discussions
do not produce authentic animated
talk . . . . The discussion resembles
monologic recitation not dialogic
conversation. (Milner and Milner,
2008, p 90-91.)

7. Presentation and Exploration
Common Practice Ideal Practice
Presentation Presentation
Exploration Exploration

8. Reflection
• What barriers do you imagine will make the
transition between presentation-oriented and
exploration-oriented talk difficult to achieve?
▫ Barriers for students?
▫ Barriers for teachers?
▫ Barriers for student-teachers?
• How can these barriers be
overcome?

9. Talk: “the sea upon which all other
language activities ride (James Britton)”

10. From Inner Speech to Expressed Thought
“The structure of speech does not simply
mirror the structure of thought; that is
why words cannot be put on by thought
like a ready-made garment. Thought
undergoes many changes as it turns
into speech. It does not merely find
expression in speech; it finds its reality
and form” (Vygotsky, 1962, p. 126)

11. Effective Listening
What we need to cultivate is active
listening: attention, understanding
and response. Substantive talking is
necessarily a reciprocal dance in which
participants reflect back what is heard, challenge
it or extend it, share observations and interpretations, and problem-solve and
brainstorm. At such a point two or more minds are actively engaged (Milner and
Milner, 2008, p 94).
Listening receives even less attention than
talking does in most classrooms. In too many
classrooms listening simply means be quiet and
pay attention to the teacher. . . .

12. Ontario Curriculum
• Closely review the following courses (next slide)
in the Ontario Grade11 and 12 English
curriculum exploring the following questions:
▫ Does the curriculum strike a balance between
presentation and exploration in its expectations
for oral language?
▫ Do you notice any differences between the various
curriculum levels (U, C, E; Compulsory,
Optional)?
▫ List four outcomes that most intrigued you.

13. • All Groups: EPS3o
• Group 1: English 3U, ETC3M
• Group 2: English 3C, EMS30
• Group 3: English 3E, ETS4U
• Group 4: English 4U, EBT40
• Group 5: English 4C, EWc4c
• Group 6: English 4E, ETs4C, EWC4U

14. Dramatic Reading
• Discuss: How do we express emotion, clarify
ideas, and arouse interest through the use of our
voice? (quick list)

15. "Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
JABBERWOCKY
Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice
Found There, 1872)
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

16. Your Turn
This Is Just To Say
by William Carlos
Williams
I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
• Step 2:
▫ In your group, discuss vocal
qualities (i.e. tone, volume,
pacing) that can be used to convey
the emotion you’ve selected.
(record your discussion
conclusions)
• Step 3:
▫ In pairs, practice reading “This is
Just to Say” in a manner that
expresses the emotion you’ve
selected.
• Step 4:
▫ Select volunteers to perform their
reading to the class.
• Step 5:
▫ Freewrite: what emotion do you
believe best fits the poem’s
narrative? Can you point to
textual cues to support your
argument?
• Step 1:
▫ Pick an emotion:
 Affection
 Lust
 Longing
 Amusement
 Excitement
 Contentment
 Pleasure
 Triumph
 Relief
 Frustration
 Vengefulness
 Contempt
 Torment
 Disappointment
 Guilt
 Remorse
 Humiliation
 Dread

17. This is Just to Say
(with apologies to William
Carlos Williams)
I have taken
The car
That was in
The garage
And which
You were probably
Planning
To take shopping
Forgive me
It was luxurious
So warm
And so frost-free

18. Choral Reading
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrAumlTzKvo
Preparation of a Poem for Choral Reading (Milner and Milner, p 99)
• Small Group:
▫ Read through your text once or twice. Then discuss it using these
questions: What does the text seem to be “about”? Does the
organization of the text help you to understand it better?
▫ Divide your text into natural sections (stanzas, key phrases, changes in
speaker or speaker perspective)
▫ Make solo, duet, trio (etc.) assignments for the parts that you identify.
▫ Decide how the readers of each part should use volume, emphasis,
speed, pause, and pitch to communicate meaning. Use symbols to mark
copies of the text so that they can become scripts for performing the text.
▫ Rehearse performing your text once or twice, revising the script to
improve it.
• Whole class
▫ Enjoy performing your text for the class. Discuss understandings.

19. Puzzlements
• In 10 minutes, complete as many of the
puzzles on the handout as possible. All
puzzles must be worked on by the whole group.
Puzzles can be completed in any order you choose.
• Analysis:
▫ Were all actively involved?
▫ Were you collaborating and building off one another
or were people trying to control hold the floor and
control the process?
▫ Did problem-solving styles reflect gender differences?
▫ Were you using language to discover meaning?

20. Fish Bowl
Topic: a) Other ideas for teaching
Oral Language; b) Concerns about
teaching oral language

21. Interviews
• Intensive Listening
▫ Gain insights into
 Ourselves
 Loved ones
 The world in which we live
StoryCorps
By recording the stories of our lives with the people we care about, we
experience our history, hopes, and humanity.

22. Sample Questions
• What has been the happiest moment of your life? The
saddest?
• What has brought you the deepest joy? The most profound
pain?
• Who has been the biggest influence on your life? What
lessons did they teach you?
• Who has been the kindest to you in your life?
• When in life have you felt most alone?
• Where do you envision yourself in ten years? In twenty?
• How would you describe a perfect day when you were young?
• Do you have any favourite stories from your childhood?
• Do you have any favourite stories from school?
• What traditions have been passed down in your family?
(Story Corps)

23. Creative Drama
• When Worlds Colide
▫ Each person pick a character from a text studied
during the semester, place them in a situation, and
provide them with a prompt to discuss.
 For example: Ophelia, Wile E Coyote, and Arty
(Maus) find themselves in a life-raft off the Titanic.
As they brave the cold of the North Atlantic, they
discuss the role that suffering has played in shaping
their lives and the lessons they’ve learned from it.

24. Assessment
• In your earlier groups (1-6).
▫ Identify the learner outcomes
(for the courses you
examined) that could be
demonstrated/learned
through each of these
activities.
▫ Identify 3 outcomes that
could not be achieved
through these activities.
Brainstorm a list of oral
language activities that could
fulfil these curriculum
objectives.
• Possible Criteria
(Harrison, 1991)
▫ Articulateness
▫ Effectiveness
▫ Register
▫ Delivery
▫ Collaboration
▫ Diction
▫ Fluency

25. Introduction to Representing
• Representing may be envisioned as the expressive counterpart of viewing.
Visual representation enables students to communicate their ideas through
a variety of text forms, including posters, diagrams, photographs, collages,
video presentations, visual art, tableaux and mime. Representing, however,
extends beyond the visual. For example, representations may have an oral
component. A speaker’s tone of voice can convey, or represent, his or her
feelings and attitudes. Music and sound effects that are selected to
accompany a dramatic monologue, a dialogue or a readers’ theatre
presentation may be representational in that they set a mood and convey an
atmosphere.
• Representing is also manifested in print. Tables and figures that accompany
informative texts may suggest spatial relationships, time sequences, and
relationships between and among concepts and ideas. Posters and other
examples of promotional print texts typically employ design principles, such
as alignment and repetition, to represent relationships and to create
emphases. (Alberta Senior High Program of Studies, 2004).